The area has a wet summer and some mist and rainfall year-round so water is fairly abundant though in the dry season obtainable in some places only by digging in the sandy beds of the rivers.

[2] The fauna includes a number of bird species unique to the highlands such as Boulton's batis (Batis margaritae), Swierstra's spurfowl (Pternistis swierstra), Angola cave-chat (Xenocopsychus ansorgei) grey-striped spurfowl (Pternistis griseostriatus) and Angola slaty flycatcher (Dioptrornis brunneus).

[2] Ludwig's double-collared sunbird (Cinnyris ludovicensis) is native to the Angolan montane forest–grassland mosaic and to the Nyika Plateau of Malawi.

Large grazing mammals recorded in the mid-1970s include Burchell's zebra (Equus quagga burchelli), common eland (Taurotragus oryx), southern reedbuck (Redunca arundinum), oribi (Ourebia ourebi), and roan antelope (Hippotragus equinus), but most are now either rare in or extirpated from the ecoregion.

[2] The highlands are one of the most heavily populated parts of Angola so the woodland is vulnerable to clearance for logging, while some of the grassland, except where it is very swampy, is being cleared for agriculture.