Yaéré

The Yaéré, from Fula yaayre, is the name of a vast annually-flooded grassland and savanna, part of the extensive floodplains around the shallow and variable Lake Chad in Central Africa.

[2] The Yaéré covers areas of northeasternmost Nigeria, of Niger, of southern Chad and of the Far North Region of Cameroon.

[3] At the beginning of the wet season the clays that compose the soil expand and form an impermeable pan over which the water collects.

[4] It is connected to the more permanent wetlands along the Logone River, which flows into the endorheic Lake Chad and seasonally overflows into the surrounding Yaéré savanna.

[5] Drought years when rains fail, such as in the 1970s, are particularly harsh on this delicately balanced ecosystem, and on the local human population that depends on seasonal fishing.