The Ngorongoro Crater in Tanzania is one of Africa’s Seven Natural Wonders, a well-deserved title considering the long list of amazing places on this continent. It is also on the list of the 10 Natural Wonders of the World and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, which had a very positive impact on wildlife preservation.
A BIT OF CONTEXT
This “cauldron-like” depression is today the world’s largest inactive, unbroken, and unfilled volcanic caldera. The volcano was taller than Mount Kilimanjaro and the eruption was so intense that it caved in on itself, an implosion creating an immense 12 -mile wide and 2,000-foot deep caldera!
Wildlife protection and local community impacts are often complex and conflicting issues. The Masai were evicted and moved to the Ngorongoro Conservation Area when the Serengeti National Park was created. Between 1974 and 2006, they were then gradually forced to evacuate the Ngorongoro as well because their presence was believed to be detrimental to the wildlife and landscape. After a mission report on these evictions, the UNESCO was actually not really helping, declaring that the “relocation of Maasai will not be a new event in Tanzania”, as if that was a good reason to continue…
The great Rift Oldupai Gorge, which is part of the greater Ngorongoro Conservation Area, is where the human race appeared. Our earliest human ancestors lived here and 2-3 million-year-old human footprints are there to prove it!
By the way, for those who still have uninformed discriminatory beliefs, science has proven that our ancestors all came from this area and were all black. White people are just black people who lost pigment to adjust to climate after migrating North…
THE NGORONGORO IS A GARDEN OF EDEN!
To stay on Christian mythology, it is reported that when Noah left his biblical Arch, he let all the animals disperse from the Ngorongoro crater. With 25,000 wild creatures, the Ngorongoro has a higher density of wildlife and predator-prey interactions per capita than almost anywhere on the planet, hence the nickname of Africa’s Garden of Eden. This is clearly a travel photography must-see spot This herd of elephants is part of the 200-300 left well-protected in the crater.
Sadly, in Africa, one elephant is still killed every 15 minutes. Read my post Will our grandchildren still be able to see elephants? for more information on this terrible statistic…
There are as many as 7,000 wildebeests in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area, and they obviously feel at home, not the tourist jeeps 😊…
The Great Wildebeest Migration (2 million wildebeest!) passes right through the Ngorongoro Conservation Area – Lake Ndutu – between December and March. I’ll do a blog post specifically on the migration and the Serengeti ecosystem in the near future. Wildebeest can, however, be observed all year-round in the crater.
The second-largest population of animals in the caldera is the zebras, so you will very likely see many zebra crossings (I know, poor joke 😢).
All these potential prey obviously attract predators. With over 60 lions within the small caldera area, you’ll be able to observe many beautiful lion kings hunting in the yellow savannah! Those can create amazing landscape photography and photography prints opportunities!
There are also more than 600 hyenas. These have a very unfair reputation as they are not pure scavengers (they hunt 70% to 90% of their prey). They are also very intelligent animals and great mothers!
The seven-square mile Lake Magadi in the crater has a unique habitat and is a great place to observe wildlife, particularly hippos.
Within this caldera, you can find more than 500 bird species, making this place amazing for observation and photography. Out of many, the black-crowned crane bird is a really beautiful one!
There are many eagles as well, like the black-chested snake eagle below.
…Or the very colorful greater Blue-eared starling bird…
…Or the blue-eyed Rufous-tailed weaver bird…
Coming back to the “Big Five”, you can observe in the caldera the impressive Cape African buffalo, as well…
You can even find black rhinos in the caldera. These were brought very close to extinction, but now their populations, due to conservation efforts, has bounced back to over 5,000 worldwide, 30 of which live in Ngorongoro Crater. I could not shoot any of these during my stay, unfortunately 😢.
More generally, a United Nations sustainable development report confirmed last year, with overwhelming evidence, that nature is declining globally at rates unprecedented in human history. The species extinction rate is accelerating: 1,000,000 species are threatened with extinction.
So places like the Ngorongoro Conservation Area should be cherished and protected so that our grandchildren can still see this amazing wildlife…
1 Comment