The Mofwe Lagoon is the largest of several lagoons in the

Luapula River The Luapula River is a north-flowing river of central Africa, within the Congo River watershed. It rises in the wetlands of Lake Bangweulu (Zambia), which are fed by the Chambeshi River. The Luapula flows west then north, marking the border betw ...

swamps south of

Lake Mweru Lake Mweru (also spelled ''Mwelu'', ''Mwero'') (, ) is a freshwater lake on the longest arm of Africa's second-longest river, the Congo. Located on the border between Zambia and Democratic Republic of the Congo, it makes up of the total length ...

, in the

Luapula Province Luapula Province is one of Zambia's ten Provinces of Zambia, provinces located in the northern part of the country. Luapula Province is named after the Luapula River and its capital is Mansa, Zambia, Mansa. As per the 2022 Zambian census, the ...

Zambia Zambia, officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central Africa, Central, Southern Africa, Southern and East Africa. It is typically referred to being in South-Central Africa or Southern Africa. It is bor ...

Geography

Its size and shape depends on the season and amount of water flowing into the swamps, especially from the Mbereshi River to the southeast, its main supplier. Generally its north–south axis is about 14 km and its east–west axis is about 6 km. Floating islands of sedge are usually found in an east–west line across its middle, which may effectively cut it in two, and at times vegetation has covered much of the southern half. The importance of the Mofwe lies in its fishery, which attracted Mwata Kazembe to settle in the town of Kanyembo on its eastern edge in the 19th century.Macola, Giacomo (2003)
''The kingdom of Kazembe: history and politics in North-Eastern Zambia and Katanga to 1950 (Studies on African History)''
Lit Verlag, p. 50. The Mofwe does not have a definite shore and is not easily accessed, being lined by a dense band of very tall reeds, and having floating rafts and islands of sedge which change its margins and shape frequently. Local fishermen paddle dugout canoes along narrow channels through the reeds to reach open water. The lagoon and surrounding swamps support populations of

hippopotamus The hippopotamus (''Hippopotamus amphibius;'' ; : hippopotamuses), often shortened to hippo (: hippos), further qualified as the common hippopotamus, Nile hippopotamus and river hippopotamus, is a large semiaquatic mammal native to sub-Sahar ...

and

crocodile Crocodiles (family (biology), family Crocodylidae) or true crocodiles are large, semiaquatic reptiles that live throughout the tropics in Africa, Asia, the Americas and Australia. The term "crocodile" is sometimes used more loosely to include ...

s. The lagoon is separated from the main channel of the Luapula by 6 km of swamps. Although the Luapula swamps are generally 30 to 40 km wide for most of their 100 km length, at the nearest point to Mofwe, the Luapula's western bank is formed by an island in the

DR Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), also known as the DR Congo, Congo-Kinshasa, or simply the Congo (the last ambiguously also referring to the neighbouring Republic of the Congo), is a country in Central Africa. By land area, it is t ...

only 12 km from Kanyembo. This facilates trade and smuggling by canoe through the channels and lagoons of the swamps.

Sources

* David Livingstone and Horace Waller (ed.): ''The Last Journals of David Livingstone in Central Africa from 1865 to his Death''. Two volumes, John Murray, 1874.

References

{{Reflist Lagoons of Africa Wetlands of Zambia Luapula River

Geography

See also

Sources

References