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Namib-Naukluft Park
The Namib-Naukluft National Park is a national park in western Namibia, situated between the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and the edge of the Great Escarpment. It encompasses part of the Namib Desert (considered the world's oldest desert), the Naukluft mountain range, and the lagoon at Sandwich Harbour. The best-known area of the park and one of the main visitor attractions in Namibia is Sossusvlei, a clay pan surrounded by dunes, and Sesriem, a small canyon of the Tsauchab. The desert research station of Gobabeb is situated within the park. Location and description With an overall area of , the Namib-Naukluft National Park was at the time of its last expansion the largest game park in Africa and the fourth largest in the world. It consists of a strip of land on the Atlantic Ocean, including of sea, that extends roughly north-to-south from the Swakop River to the B4 road to Lüderitz. Wildlife A surprising collection of creatures survives in the hyper-arid region, includi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Namibia
Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the northeast, approximating a quadripoint, Zimbabwe lies less than 200 metres (660 feet) away along the Zambezi, Zambezi River near Kazungula, Zambia. Namibia's capital and largest city is Windhoek. Namibia is the driest country in sub-Saharan Africa, and has been inhabited since prehistoric times by the Khoekhoe, Khoi, San people, San, Damara people, Damara and Nama people. Around the 14th century, immigration, immigrating Bantu peoples arrived as part of the Bantu expansion. From 1600 the Ovambo people#History, Ovambo formed kingdoms, such as Ondonga and Oukwanyama. In 1884, the German Empire established rule over most of the territory, forming a colony known as German South West Africa. Between 1904 and 1908, German troops waged a punitive ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Snake
Snakes are elongated limbless reptiles of the suborder Serpentes (). Cladistically squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales much like other members of the group. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more joints than their lizard ancestors and relatives, enabling them to swallow prey much larger than their heads ( cranial kinesis). To accommodate their narrow bodies, snakes' paired organs (such as kidneys) appear one in front of the other instead of side by side, and most only have one functional lung. Some species retain a pelvic girdle with a pair of vestigial claws on either side of the cloaca. Lizards have independently evolved elongate bodies without limbs or with greatly reduced limbs at least twenty-five times via convergent evolution, leading to many lineages of legless lizards. These resemble snakes, but several common groups of legless lizards have eyelids and external ears, which snakes lack, althoug ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kopjes
An inselberg or monadnock ( ) is an isolated rock hill, knob, ridge, or small mountain that rises abruptly from a gently sloping or virtually level surrounding plain. In Southern Africa, a similar formation of granite is known as a koppie, an Afrikaans word ("little head") from the Dutch diminutive word ''kopje''. If the inselberg is dome-shaped and formed from granite or gneiss, it can also be called a bornhardt, though not all bornhardts are inselbergs. An inselberg results when a body of rock resistant to erosion, such as granite, occurring within a body of softer rocks, is exposed by differential erosion and lowering of the surrounding landscape. Etymology Inselberg The word ''inselberg'' is a loan word from German, and means "island mountain". The term was coined in 1900 by geologist Wilhelm Bornhardt (1864–1946) to describe the abundance of such features found in eastern Africa. At that time, the term applied only to arid landscape features. However, it has si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jackal
Jackals are Canidae, canids native to Africa and Eurasia. While the word has historically been used for many canines of the subtribe Canina (subtribe), canina, in modern use it most commonly refers to three species: the closely related black-backed jackal (''Lupulella mesomelas'') and side-striped jackal (''Lupulella adusta'') of Central Africa, Central and Southern Africa, and the golden jackal (''Canis aureus'') of south-central Europe and Asia. The African golden wolf (''Canis lupaster'') was also formerly considered a jackal. While they do not form a monophyly, monophyletic clade, all jackals are opportunistic omnivores, predators of small to medium-sized animals and proficient scavengers. Their long legs and curved canine teeth are adapted for hunting small mammals, birds, and reptiles, and their large feet and fused leg bones give them a physique well-suited for long-distance running, capable of maintaining speeds of for extended periods of time. Jackals are crepuscular, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bat-eared Fox
The bat-eared fox (''Otocyon megalotis'') is a species of fox found on the African savanna. It is the only extant species of the genus ''Otocyon'' and a Basal (phylogenetics), basal species of Canidae, canid. Fossil records indicate this canid first appeared during the Chibanian, middle Pleistocene. There are two separate populations of the bat-eared fox, each of which makes up a subspecies. The bat referred to in its colloquial name is possibly the Egyptian slit-faced bat (''Nycteris thebaica''), which is abundant in the region and has very large ears. Other vernacular names include big-eared fox, black-eared fox, long-eared fox, Delalande's fox, cape fox, and motlosi. It is named for its large ears, which have a role in thermoregulation. It is a small canid, being of comparable size to the closely related cape fox and common raccoon dog. Its fur varies in color depending on the subspecies, but is generally tan-colored and has guard hairs of a grey agouti (coloration), agouti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Caracal
The caracal (''Caracal caracal'') () is a medium-sized Felidae, wild cat native to Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and arid areas of Pakistan and northwestern India. It is characterised by a robust build, long legs, a short face, long tufted ears, relatively short tail, and long canine teeth. Its coat is uniformly reddish tan or sandy, while the ventral parts are lighter with small reddish markings. It reaches at the shoulder and weighs . It was first scientific description, scientifically described by German naturalist Johann Christian Daniel von Schreber in 1776. Three subspecies are recognised. Typically nocturnality, nocturnal, the caracal is highly secretive and difficult to observe. It is territory (animal), territorial, and lives mainly alone or in pairs. The caracal is a carnivore that typically preys upon birds, rodents, and other small mammals. It can leap higher than and catch birds in midair. It stalks its prey until it is within of it, after which it ru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Baboon
Baboons are primates comprising the biology, genus ''Papio'', one of the 23 genera of Old World monkeys, in the family Cercopithecidae. There are six species of baboon: the hamadryas baboon, the Guinea baboon, the olive baboon, the yellow baboon, the Kinda baboon and the chacma baboon. Each species is native to one of six areas of Africa and the hamadryas baboon is also native to part of the Arabian Peninsula. Baboons are among the largest non-hominoid primates and have existed for at least two million years. Baboons vary in size and weight depending on the species. The smallest, the Kinda baboon, is in length and weighs only , while the largest, the chacma baboon, is up to in length and weighs . All baboons have long, dog-like muzzles, heavy, powerful jaws with sharp canine teeth, close-set eyes, thick fur except on their muzzles, short tails, and nerveless, hairless pads of skin on their protruding buttocks called callosity, ischial callosities that provide for sitting co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cape Fox
The Cape fox (''Vulpes chama''), also called the asse, cama fox or the silver-backed fox, is a small species of fox, native to southern Africa. It is also called a South African version of a fennec fox due to its similarly big ears. It is the only "true fox" occurring in sub-Saharan Africa, and it retains primitive characteristics of ''Vulpes'' because it diverged early in the evolutionary history of the group. Description ''Vulpes chama'' is a small-built canid, usually measuring long, not including its tail, which is typically . It is tall at the shoulder, and usually weighs from . The skull is very similar to that of '' V. bengalensis'', although the cranium of ''V. chama'' is slightly wider and the maxillary region is slightly shorter. The ears are relatively large and sharp, the muzzle is small and pointed. Pelage colour is silvery-gray, tawny at the back of the ears, with white hairs appearing around the side of the pinna in the center. The colour of the n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
African Wildcat
The African wildcat (''Felis lybica'') is a small wildcat species with sandy grey fur, pale vertical stripes on the sides and around the face. It is native to Africa, West and Central Asia, and is distributed to Rajasthan in India and Xinjiang in China. It inhabits a broad variety of landscapes ranging from deserts to savannas, shrublands and grasslands. The African wildcat is the ancestor of the domestic cat (''F. catus''). Some African wildcats were domesticated about 10,000 years ago in the Near East. Interspecific hybrids between both species are common where their ranges overlap. Taxonomy ''Felis lybica'' was the scientific name proposed in 1780 by Georg Forster who based his description on a specimen from Gafsa on the Barbary Coast that had the size of a domestic cat, but a reddish fur, short black tufts on the ears, and a ringed tail. Between the late 18th and 20th centuries, several naturalists and curators of natural history museums described and proposed new nam ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leopard
The leopard (''Panthera pardus'') is one of the five extant cat species in the genus ''Panthera''. It has a pale yellowish to dark golden fur with dark spots grouped in rosettes. Its body is slender and muscular reaching a length of with a long tail and a shoulder height of . Males typically weigh , and females . The leopard was first described in 1758, and several subspecies were proposed in the 19th and 20th centuries. Today, eight subspecies are recognised in its wide range in Africa and Asia. It initially evolved in Africa during the Early Pleistocene, before migrating into Eurasia around the Early–Middle Pleistocene transition. Leopards were formerly present across Europe, but became extinct in the region at around the end of the Late Pleistocene-early Holocene. The leopard is adapted to a variety of habitats ranging from rainforest to steppe, including arid and montane areas. It is an opportunistic predator, hunting mostly ungulates and primates. It relies on it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Springbok
The springbok or springbuck (''Antidorcas marsupialis'') is an antelope found mainly in south and southwest Africa. The sole member of the genus (biology), genus ''Antidorcas'', this bovid was first Species description, described by the German zoologist Eberhard August Wilhelm von Zimmermann in 1780. Three subspecies are identified. A slender, long-legged antelope, the springbok reaches at the shoulder and weighs between . Both sexes have a pair of black, long horn (anatomy), horns that curve backwards. The springbok is characterised by a white face, a dark stripe running from the eyes to the mouth, a light brown coat (animal), coat marked by a reddish-brown stripe that runs from the upper foreleg to the buttocks across the flanks like the Thomson's gazelle, and a white Rump (animal), rump flap. Active mainly at dawn and dusk, springbok form harem (zoology), harems (mixed-sex herds). In earlier times, springbok of the Kalahari Desert and Karoo migrated in large numbers acros ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
