UGANDA: Kidepo Valley National Park Home To World’s Most Rare Animal Species

That Uganda is gifted by nature is an assertion very few can dispute, especially when you taste nature by visiting Kidepo Valley National Park.

When most people talk about Kidepo Valley National Park, what strikes their mind are the elephants.

Although elephants are herbivores known to consume only plant life, there is a rare species called Bull Bull that takes kwete, a local brew, and residues of a local potent gin, (ajono), as food.

But beyond the elephants, the park is home to the giraffe (Giraffa Camelopardalis), an African even-toed ungulate mammal, the tallest living terrestrial animal and the largest ruminant.

Its species name, girraffe Camepardalis, refers to its camel-like shape and its leopard-like colouring.

“Kidepo Valley National Park is a biodiversity park. It is not only about elephants but also the famous giraffes,” said Phillip Akorony, a guide.

Akorony says the giraffe is the tallest mammal in the world with new born babies being taller than humans.
According to him, it is the only mammal that spends most of its life standing because it even sleeps, gives birth standing.

“Giraffes often spend 10 minutes and two hours asleep making it the only mammal with the shortest sleep requirements,” added Akorony.
He said giraffes are sociable, peaceful animals that rarely fight although males perform a behaviour called necking where they hit the necks, however, these encounters really last more than a couple of minutes and seldom result in injury.

The warden in charge of information, research and tourism, Herbert Kitimbo, says just like snowflakes and human finger prints, there are no girraffes having the same spot pattern.

“Their tongues are about 45cm long and are especially adapted to allow girraffes to forage trees that other animals would avoid such as acacia which are thorny. The giraffe is a symbol of intuition and flexibility,” said Kitimbo.

When it comes to giraffes, Kidepo park stands out, this invaluable natural resource has been visited and revisited and its extra-ordinary features shape its outstanding beauty, which remain a myth to those who have not visited it.

Records at Kidepo indicate that the park has about 36 giraffes spread all over the area.

“When we visited the park to do statistics, we found 36 but later when tourists came around to see them, they walked and managed to only get 32 giraffes, so this means that we have between 30 and 38 giraffes at the park,” said Mr Kitimbo.

Kidepo Valley National Park was established in the 1960s under the first rule of president Milton Obote (1962 - 1971). The national park overlooks the expansive grassy plains dotted with big rocky outcrops and flanked by steep jagged mountains with the summit ridges of Napore Range, Taan hills and Natera hills, part of Nyangea, Morongole and Zuulia forest reserves are located within the park.

The few who make the journey north through the wild frontier region of Karamoja to visit it, would agree that it is among the most magnificent in Africa’s finest wilderness.

The area conservation manager, Johnson Masereka, says Kidepo has the most exciting fauna of any Ugandan national park with 77 species of mammals, several of which are (in Uganda) restricted to Kidepo Valley National Park.

Just look at those localised carnivores, the bat-eared fox, the stripped hyena, Aardwolf, Caraca and Cheeta, lion, leopard, spotted hyena and black-backed and side stripped jackal, these are not in any other park.

He said besides the giraffes and carnivores, there are other large ungulates animals that make up the main tourist attraction at Kidepo and they include zebras, bush pigs, warthogs, water bucks, lions, reedbucks, oribi, buffaloes, crocodiles, elands, Jackson’s hartebeest, and five species of primates are also found in the park, including the endemic Kavirondo bush baby.

“The park also boasts about an extensive bird list of 463 species confirmed and 26 unconfirmed, second only in Uganda to Queen Elizabeth National park,” says Akorony.

Kidepo Valley National Park is a 1,442-sqKm (557 square miles) national park in the Karamoja sub-region of northeast Uganda, Kaabong District to be exact.

It is located approximately 220 km (140 miles), by road northwest of Moroto, the largest town in the sub-region. Kidepo has rugged savannah, dominated by the 2,750 metres (9,020 feet) Mt Morungole and transected by the Kidepo and Narus rivers. Tucked in Uganda’s most remote north-eastern corner, some 700km from Kampala and tucked between borders with Sudan and Kenya, Kidepo valley is an isolated park.