Mount Yao is a mountain in northern

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

. It is located in

Niassa Province Niassa is a province of Mozambique. It has an area of 129,056 km2 and a population of 1,810,794 (2017). It is the most sparsely populated province in the country. Lichinga is the capital of the province. There are a minimum estimated 450,000 Ya ...

, in

Niassa National Reserve Niassa Reserve is a nature reserve in Cabo Delgado Province and Niassa Province, Mozambique. Covering over , it is the largest protected area in the country. The reserve is part of the Trans-Frontier Conservation Area and links to the Tanzanian ...

. The mountain is named for the

Yao people The Yao people (its majority branch is also known as Mien; ; vi, người Dao) is a government classification for various minorities in China and Vietnam. They are one of the 55 officially recognised ethnic minorities in China and reside in ...

who live in the area around the mountain. Mount Yao is an isolated granite outcrop or

inselberg An inselberg or monadnock () is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain. In Southern Africa a similar formation of granite is known as a koppie, a ...

, and is relatively isolated from other mountains.

Mount Mecula Mount Mecula (Portuguese: ''Serra Mecula'') is a mountain in northern Mozambique. It is located in Niassa Province, near the center of Niassa National Reserve. Mount Mecula is an isolated granite outcrop or inselberg, and is relatively isolated ...

is located to 128 km to the northeast in the national reserve. The

Njesi Highlands The Njesi Highlands (Portuguese: ''Serra Jeci'') are a range of mountains in northern Mozambique. Geography The highlands rise east of Lake Malawi in the western portion of Mozambique's Niassa Province. They are north of Lichinga, the provincia ...

lie to the west.

Miombo woodland The Miombo woodland is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome (in the World Wide Fund for Nature scheme) located primarily in Central Africa. It includes four woodland savanna ecoregions (listed below) characterized b ...

is the predominant plant community on the mountain. The mountain has patches of evergreen forest and swamp forest at higher elevations, and

riparian forest A riparian forest or riparian woodland is a forested or wooded area of land adjacent to a body of water such as a river, stream, pond, lake, marshland, estuary, canal, sink or reservoir. Etymology The term riparian comes from the Latin word '' ...

corridors in stream valleys descend to 1000 meters elevation. The flowering plant '' Moraea niassensis'', an iris relative, is endemic to the mountain.Goldblatt, P., Manning, J., Von Blittersdorff, R., & Weber, O. (2014). New species of Gladiolus L. and Moraea Mill. (Iridaceae) from Tanzania and Mozambique. ''Kew Bulletin'', 69(2), 1-8. Retrieved February 11, 2021, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/24637549

References

{{reflist Yao Eastern miombo woodlands Geography of Niassa Province