Etosha Pan
Etosha Pan | |
---|---|
Location | Namibia |
Coordinates | 18°47′07″S 16°15′50″E / 18.78528°S 16.26389°E |
Lake Oponono & Cuvelai drainage | |
Designated | August 23, 1995 |
The Etosha Pan is a large
Location and description
Etosha, meaning 'Great White Place' in Oshindonga, is made of a large mineral pan.
The area exhibits a characteristic white and greenish surface, which spreads over 4,800 square kilometres (1,900 sq mi).
It is assumed that the
History
In the colonial era, the first non-Africans to explore this area were the Europeans Charles John Andersson and Francis Galton in 1851.
Plants and animals
The surrounding area is dense mopane woodland which is occupied by herds of elephants on the south side of the lake. Mopane trees are common throughout south-central Africa, and host the mopane worm, which is the larval form of the moth Gonimbrasia belina, and an important source of protein for rural communities.
The salt desert supports very little plant life except for the blue-green algae that gives the Etosha Pan its characteristic colouring, and grasses like Sporobolus spicatus which quickly grow in the wet mud following good rains. Surrounding the pan, grasslands provide food for grazing animals.
This harsh dry land with its sparse vegetation and insufficient amount of salty water, supports little wildlife all year round, but is sometimes inhabited by a large number of migratory birds. The hypersaline pan supports brine shrimp and a number of extremophile micro-organisms tolerant of the high saline conditions.(C.Michael Hogan. 2010.) In particularly good rainy seasons the Etosha pan is turned into a shallow lake approximately 10 cm in depth and becomes the breeding ground for flamingos, which arrive in their thousands and great white pelican (Pelecanus onocrotalus).
The surrounding savanna is home to thousands of mammals that will visit the pan and surrounding waterholes when there is water. These include quite large numbers of zebra, wildebeest, gemsbok, springbok and eland, as well as black rhinoceros, bush elephants, lions, leopards, and giraffe.
Threats and protection
The Etosha Pan is situated completely within the boundaries of the Etosha National Park and is designated as a
References
- "Ekuma River and Etosha Pan, Namibia". NASA Earth Observatory. Archived from the original on 2006-10-01. Retrieved 2006-05-01.
- C.Michael Hogan. 2010. Extremophile. eds. E.Monosson and C.Cleveland. Encyclopedia of Earth. National Council for Science and the Environment, Washington DC
- "Etosha Pan halophytics". Terrestrial Ecoregions. World Wildlife Fund.
- Etosha National Park