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Vundu
The vundu (''Heterobranchus longifilis'') is a species of large airbreathing catfish found widely in rivers and other freshwater habitats of sub-Saharan Africa, as well as the Nile. It is also called the sampa, cur, lenda, or certa. Description The vundu is the largest true freshwater fish in southern Africa, reaching up to in length and in weight. (Bull sharks are also found in southern Africa and reach a larger size, but occur in both fresh and saltwater.) Few other catfish have such large second dorsal fins (adipose fins) or such long barbels as do the vundu. Its barbels nearly reach to the origin of the pelvic fin. The colour of ''Heterobranchus longifilis'' is light to dark olive brown on its dorsal surface, getting lighter over the mid-body to a light brown. Its belly is off-white. Fins are usually light brown. In aquaculture, it is sometimes hybridized with another very large species, the African sharptooth catfish (''Clarias gariepinus''), resulting in offspring known ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
African Sharptooth Catfish
''Clarias gariepinus'' or African sharptooth catfish is a species of catfish of the family Clariidae, the airbreathing catfishes. Distribution They are found throughout Africa and the Middle East, and live in freshwater lakes, rivers, and swamps, as well as human-made habitats, such as oxidation ponds or even urban sewage systems. The African sharptooth catfish was introduced all over the world in the early 1980s for aquaculture purposes, so is found in countries far outside its natural habitat, such as Brazil, Vietnam, Indonesia, and India. Description The African sharptooth catfish is a large, eel-like fish, usually of dark gray or black coloration on the back, fading to a white belly. In Africa, this catfish has been reported as being second in size only to the vundu of the Zambesian waters, References External links Reproduction of African catfish [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58See the 2014 version of the ICS geologic time scale million years ago. It is the second and most recent epoch of the Neogene Period in the . The Pliocene follows the Epoch and is followed by the Epoch. Prior to the 2009 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volta River
The Volta River is the main river system in the West African country of Ghana. It flows south into Ghana from the Bobo-Dioulasso highlands of Burkina Faso. The main parts of the river are the Black Volta, the White Volta, and the Red Volta. In the northwest, the Black Volta forms the international borders between the Ivory Coast, Ghana, and Burkina Faso. The Volta flows southward along the Akwapim-Togoland highlands, and it empties into the Atlantic Ocean at the Gulf of Guinea at Ada Foah. It has a smaller tributary river, the Oti, which enters Ghana from Togo in the east. The Volta River has been dammed at Akosombo for the purpose of generating hydroelectricity. The reservoir named Lake Volta stretches from Akosombo Dam in the south to the northern part of the country, and is the largest man-made reservoir by area in the world. Volta was named by the Portuguese, meaning twist or turn. The country of Burkina Faso was formerly called Upper Volta, after the river. The reserv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Insect
Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body ( head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes and one pair of antennae. Their blood is not totally contained in vessels; some circulates in an open cavity known as the haemocoel. Insects are the most diverse group of animals; they include more than a million described species and represent more than half of all known living organisms. The total number of extant species is estimated at between six and ten million; In: potentially over 90% of the animal life forms on Earth are insects. Insects may be found in nearly all environments, although only a small number of species reside in the oceans, which are dominated by another arthropod group, crustaceans, which recent research has indicated insects are nested within. Nearly all insects hatch from eggs. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Invertebrate
Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate subphylum Vertebrata. Familiar examples of invertebrates include arthropods, mollusks, annelids, echinoderms and cnidarians. The majority of animal species are invertebrates; one estimate puts the figure at 97%. Many invertebrate taxa have a greater number and variety of species than the entire subphylum of Vertebrata. Invertebrates vary widely in size, from 50 μm (0.002 in) rotifers to the 9–10 m (30–33 ft) colossal squid. Some so-called invertebrates, such as the Tunicata and Cephalochordata, are more closely related to vertebrates than to other invertebrates. This makes the invertebrates paraphyletic, so the term has little meaning in taxonomy. Etymology The word "invertebrate" comes from the Latin word ''vertebra'', whi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Edward
Lake Edward (locally Rwitanzigye or Rweru) is one of the smaller African Great Lakes. It is located in the Albertine Rift, the western branch of the East African Rift, on the border between the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Uganda, with its northern shore a few kilometres south of the equator. History Henry Morton Stanley first saw the lake in 1888, during the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition. The lake was named in honour of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, son of then British monarch Queen Victoria, and later to become King Edward VII. In 1973, Uganda and Zaire (DRC) renamed it Lake Idi Amin after Ugandan dictator Idi Amin. After his overthrow in 1979, it recovered its former name. In 2014, the lake was the center of an oil dispute. SOCO international entered the premises of the Virunga National Park where the lake is situated to prospect for oil. However, villagers and workers who attempted to stop the oil company from entering the area were beaten up and even kidnapp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Tanganyika
Lake Tanganyika () is an African Great Lake. It is the second-oldest freshwater lake in the world, the second-largest by volume, and the second-deepest, in all cases after Lake Baikal in Siberia. It is the world's longest freshwater lake. The lake is shared among four countries—Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Burundi, and Zambia, with Tanzania (46%) and DRC (40%) possessing the majority of the lake. It drains into the Congo River system and ultimately into the Atlantic Ocean. Etymology "Tanganika" was the name of the lake that Henry Morton Stanley encountered when he was at Ujiji in 1876. The name first originated from the Bembe language when they arrived in South Kivu around the 7th century, they discovered the lake and started calling it “êtanga ‘ya’ni’â” which means “a big river” in their Bantu language. Stanley found also other names for the lake among different ethnic groups, like the Kimana, the Yemba and the Msaga. An alt ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zambezi River
The Zambezi River (also spelled Zambeze and Zambesi) is the fourth-longest river in Africa, the longest east-flowing river in Africa and the largest flowing into the Indian Ocean from Africa. Its drainage basin covers , slightly less than half of the Nile's. The river rises in Zambia and flows through eastern Angola, along the north-eastern border of Namibia and the northern border of Botswana, then along the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe to Mozambique, where it crosses the country to empty into the Indian Ocean. The Zambezi's most noted feature is Victoria Falls. Its other falls include the Chavuma Falls at the border between Zambia and Angola, and Ngonye Falls near Sioma in western Zambia. The two main sources of hydroelectric power on the river are the Kariba Dam, which provides power to Zambia and Zimbabwe, and the Cahora Bassa Dam in Mozambique, which provides power to Mozambique and South Africa. Additionally, two smaller power stations are along the Zambezi Ri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Kariba
Lake Kariba is the world's largest artificial lake and reservoir (water), reservoir by List of lakes by volume, volume. It lies upstream from the Indian Ocean, along the border between Zambia and Zimbabwe. Lake Kariba was filled between 1958 and 1963 following the completion of the Kariba Dam at its northeastern end, flooding the Kariba Gorge on the Zambezi River. The Zimbabwean town of Kariba, Zimbabwe, Kariba was built for construction workers on the lake's dam, while some other settlements such as Binga village and Mlibizi in Zimbabwe and Siavonga and Sinazongwe in Zambia have grown up to house people displaced by the rising waters. Physical characteristics Lake Kariba is over long and up to in width. It covers an area of and its storage capacity is . The mean depth of the lake is ; the maximum depth is . It is the world's largest man-made reservoir by volume, four times as large as the Three Gorges Dam. The enormous mass of water (approximately 180,000,000,000,000 kilogra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lake Rukwa
Lake Rukwa is an endorheic lake located the Rukwa Valley of Rukwa Region, Songwe Region and Katavi Region in southwestern Tanzania. The lake is the third largest inland body of water in the country. Geography The alkaline Lake Rukwa lies midway between Lake Tanganyika and Lake Malawi at an elevation of about , in a parallel branch of the rift system. Almost half of the lake lies in Uwanda Game Reserve. Hydrology The lake has seen large fluctuations in its size over the years, due to varying inflow of streams. Currently it is about long and averages about wide, making it about in size. In 1929 it was only about long, but in 1939 it was about long and wide. During the early rifting of this part of Africa, the basin of Lake Rukwa may at times have been part of a much larger basin which also included the basins of Lake Tanganyika with Lake Malawi; ancient shorelines suggest a final date of overflow into Lake Tanganyika of 33,000BP. For overflow to occur again, the lake's ele ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Congo River Basin
The Congo River ( kg, Nzâdi Kôngo, french: Fleuve Congo, pt, Rio Congo), formerly also known as the Zaire River, is the second longest river in Africa, shorter only than the Nile, as well as the second largest river in the world by discharge volume, following only the Amazon. It is also the world's deepest recorded river, with measured depths around . The Congo- Lualaba- Chambeshi River system has an overall length of , which makes it the world's ninth- longest river. The Chambeshi is a tributary of the Lualaba River, and ''Lualaba'' is the name of the Congo River upstream of Boyoma Falls, extending for . Measured along with the Lualaba, the main tributary, the Congo River has a total length of . It is the only major river to cross the Equator twice. The Congo Basin has a total area of about , or 13% of the entire African landmass. Name The name ''Congo/Kongo'' originates from the Kingdom of Kongo once located on the southern bank of the river. The kingdom in turn was nam ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Omo River (Ethiopia)
The Omo River (also called Omo-Bottego) in southern Ethiopia is the largest Ethiopian river outside the Nile Basin. Its course is entirely contained within the boundaries of Ethiopia, and it empties into Lake Turkana on the border with Kenya. The river is the principal stream of an endorheic drainage basin, the Turkana Basin. The river basin is famous for its large number of early hominid fossils and archeological findings such as early stone tools, leading to its inclusion on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1980. Geography The Omo River forms through the confluence of the Gibe River, by far the largest total tributary of the Omo River, and the Wabe River, the largest left-bank tributary of the Omo at . Given their sizes, lengths and courses one might consider both the Omo and the Gibe rivers to be one and the same river but with different names. Consequently, the whole river basin is sometimes called the ''Omo-Gibe River Basin''. This river basin includes part of the wester ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
