Wildlife of Oman

Central Oman consists of a tableland bounded to the west by the Rub' al Khali desert of Saudi Arabia.

In the south of the country in the Dhofar Governorate, the mountains run in an easterly-westerly direction and include Jabal Samhan and Jebel Qamar.

The low-albedo desert interior heats up and the hot air rises, but the humidity is so low that no clouds form.

The most famous is probably Boswellia sacra, the frankincense tree, which only grows in the mountains of southern Oman, Yemen and Somaliland.

In some cases plant life can be accommodated on small sandy mounds in these sabkhas known as nabkhas due to their relatively lower salinity levels.

[3] One of the last places in which the Arabian leopard survives is the Dhofar mountains in southern Oman, and the Jabal Samhan Nature Reserve has been set up to protect these critically endangered big cats.

The east coast with its mudflats and lagoons is visited by many species of wader, and the mangrove areas are home to the red-wattled lapwing and the collared kingfisher.

Measures have been put in place to protect the beaches where the endangered green sea turtle breed,[11] a leopard conservation trust has been set up, and the Arabian Oryx Sanctuary was established and became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994.

However, the Omani government later reduced the size of the protected area by about 90% to allow for oil prospecting, and in 2007, the sanctuary became the first ever World Heritage Site to be delisted.