Wildlife of Tanzania
In the 1990s, exports of 1.68 million birds, 523,000 reptiles, 12,000 mammals and 148,000 amphibians occurred, in addition to an increase in wildlife related tourism by about 30%.
It encompasses the montane forests and alpine deserts of Mount Meru, Africa's fifth highest mountain at 4,566 metres (14,980 ft).
[13] Its natural topography consists of steep hill slopes, river valleys, and the sandy northern shores of Lake Tanganyika.
[19] Eland, sable and roan antelopes are found in substantial numbers, and its marshy lakes have Tanzania's densest population of hippopotamus and Nile crocodile.
[19] Elephant, lion, spotted hyena, African buffalo, giraffe, zebra, impala, and reedbuck are a common sight during the dry season.
Resident wild animals include elephant, leopard, African buffalo, the endangered Abbott's duiker, and other small antelopes and primates.
However, it is popular for mountaineering expeditions to climb the volcanic cones of Kibo, which has several remnant glaciers, and Mawenzi and to witness the Afro-montane moorland habitat.
The municipality of Moshi is near several of the park entrances and is 128 square kilometres (49 sq mi) east of the larger city of Arusha.
It is hemmed between the rugged peaks of the Kipengere, Poroto, and Livingstone Mountains and has volcanic soils, and is drained by the Ruaha River.
Bird life is also very widely watched by ornithologists and consists mainly of Denham’s bustard, endangered blue swallow, mountain marsh widow, Njombe cisticola and Kipengere seedeater.
[23] Mahale Mountains National Park, next to the Gombe Stream National Park is set on the shores of the Lake Tanganyika in Uvinza District of Kigoma Region, with a watershed comprising richly forested Mahale Mountains with its peaks as high as 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) above the lake shore.
Nkungwe peak (2,460 metres (8,070 ft)) is the park’s largest mountain in the Mahale range which is venerated by the local Tongwe people.
Wild animals seen are troops of baboons, blue monkeys, bushbuck, giraffes, tree climbing lions, squadrons of banded mongoose, Kirk's dik-dik and pairs of klipspringer.
The entry gate to the park is 126 kilometres (78 mi), west of Arusha from Mto wa Mbu, an ethnic town.
Recent activities in the park relate to "canoeing, mountain biking, walking and abseiling" It is located between Lake Victoria and the Arusha-Dodoma Road.
It is connected by a 283 kilometres (176 mi) road with Dar es Salaam, via Selous Reserve, Ruaha, Udzungwa and Katavi.
Known as a "water wonderland", it is fish breeding ground; tilapia, yellow-spotted otters and Nile perch (as heavy as 100 kilograms (220 lb)) are some of the special species.
Before it was declared a national park it was maintained by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) with the objective to preserve the last coastal rainforest in the country.
The habitat, bounded by Kenya and bordered by Lake Victoria on the west, is characterized by vast plains, savannah, wooded hills, large termite mounds, rivers, and acacia woodlands.
This migration is in unison with 200,000 zebra and 300,000 Thomson's gazelle in search of grazing pastures, aptly described as "six million hooves pound the open plains".
Other mammals seen here are buffaloes, elephants, giraffe, large number of elands, topis, kongonis, impalas, and Grant's gazelles.
The predators inhabiting the park are lions, leopards, jackals, spotted hyenas, rock hyrax and serval cats.
Mammals in the park are a number of elephants and migratory wildebeest, zebra, buffalo, impala, gazelle, hartebeest and eland.
In the East Usambara Mountains, the forests display many rare species, so much so that the fauna found here have been compared to the Galapagos Islands in terms of biological importance.
[42][43] Some of the species reported are African bush elephant (Loxodonta africana), Burchell's zebra (Equus burchellii), Thomson's gazelle (Eudorcas thomsonii), hartebeest (Alcelaphus buselaphus), woodland dormouse (Graphiurus murinus), kipunji (Rungwecebus kipunji), Thomas's bushbaby (Galago thomasi), Prince Demidoff's bushbaby (Galagoides demidovii), puku (Kobus vardonii), gerenuk (Litocranius walleri), common warthog (Phacochoerus africanus), pygmy scaly-tailed flying squirrel (Idiurus zenkeri), suni (Neotragus moschatus), mbarapi (Hippotragus niger) and North African crested porcupine (Hystrix cristata).
[45] The conservation status of grey crowned cranes found in wetland-grassland habitats of eastern and southern Africa including Tanzania is listed as vulnerable.
Poaching and anthropological pressure to meet the huge demand of wildlife meat has been a major problem in Tanzania with reported removal of 160,000 to 200,000 animals annually in the 1990s.
Anti-poaching operations have been conducted on several occasions and game-viewing tourism has been a success in the easily accessible northern wildlife area of the country.
Trophy hunting has also provided some respite to the problem and this has helped in generating revenue, generally in the northern, southern and western wildlife areas.
[5] A February 2020 report on wildlife censuses carried out in October 2018 and November 2018 in the Selous-Mikumi ecosystem indicates that populations of elephants, hippopotamuses, and zebras have increased and that poaching has been brought under control.
