Ruaha National Park

The Largest National Park in Tanzania

Two Elephants in the Ruaha savanah

Ruaha National Park is the largest national park in Tanzania. It covers an area of about 20,200 km². It is located in the middle of Tanzania about 130 km fromIringa. The park is part of a more extensive ecosystem which includes Rungwa Game Reserve, Usangu Game Reserve, and several other protected areas.

The name of the park is derived from the Great Ruaha River, which flows along its south-eastern margin and is the focus for game-viewing. The park can be reached by car via Iringa and there is an airstrip at Msembe, park headquarters.

Ruaha is famous for its large population of Elephants. Presently about 10.000 are roaming the park. Ruaha National Park is also a true birdwatchers paradise: 436 species have been identified of an estimated total of 475. Among the resident birds are different species of Hornbills, Kingfishers and Sunbirds. Also many migrants visit Ruaha, e.g. the White Stork

Other special animals in Ruaha are: the African Wild Dog and Sable Antelope. Rhinoceros were last been sighted in 1982 and are probably extinct in the park due to poaching.

The best times to visit for predators and large mammals is the dry season (May-December) and for birds and flowers, the wet season (January-April).

Area
10,300 sq km (3,980 sq miles)

Getting there
Central Tanzania, 128km (80 miles) west of Iringa

What to do
Day walks or hiking safaris through untouched bush.
Stone age ruins at Isimila, near Iringa, 120 km (75 miles) away, one of Africa’s most important historical sites .

Wildlife

The game viewing starts the moment the plane touches down. A giraffe races beside the airstrip, all legs and neck, yet oddly elegant in its awkwardness. A line of zebras parades across the runway in the giraffe’s wake. In the distance, beneath a bulbous baobab tree, a few representatives of Ruaha’s 10,000 elephants – the largest population of any East African national park, form a protective huddle around their young. At the Great Ruaha River, impala, waterbuck and other antelopes risk their life for a sip of life-sustaining water. And the risk is considerable: not only from the prides of 20-plus lion that lord over the savannah, but also from the cheetahs that stalk the open grassland and the leopards that lurk in tangled riverine thickets. This impressive array of large predators is boosted by both striped and spotted hyena, as well as several conspicuous packs of the highly endangered African wild dog. Ruaha’s unusually high diversity of antelope is a function of its location, Grant’s gazelle and lesser kudu occur here at the very south of their range, alongside the miombo-associated sable and roan antelope, and one of East AfricaÆs largest populations of greater kudu, the park emblem, distinguished by the male’s magnificent corkscrew horns.

Birdlife
A similar duality is noted in the checklist of 450 birds: the likes of crested barbet, an attractive yellow-and-black bird whose persistent trilling is a characteristic sound of the southern bush, occur in Ruaha alongside central Tanzanian endemics such as the yellow-collared lovebird and ashy starling.

Best time to Visit
For predators and large mammals, dry season (mid-May-December);
bird-watching, lush scenery and wildflowers, wet season (January-April).
The male greater kudu is most visible in June, the breeding season.

Highlights
Second only to Katavi in its aura of untrammelled wilderness, but far more accessible, Ruaha protects a vast tract of the rugged, semi-arid bush country that characterises central Tanzania. Its lifeblood is the Great Ruaha River, which courses along the eastern boundary in a flooded torrent during the height of the rains, but dwindling thereafter to a scattering of precious pools surrounded by a blinding sweep of sand and rock.