Qualla: Zambezian flooded grasslands

Zambezian flooded grasslands: Introduction

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0. The rainy season arrives in November and runs until March, and over those months the Zambezi and its tributaries swell beyond their banks in ways that redraw the map of southern Africa. Entire landscapes flood and then, slowly, recede. Grasses that have lain dormant through the dry months surge back. Herds of lechwe antelope move in pursuit of fresh growth; the waterbucks follow; crocodiles and hippos occupy the deeper channels. By the end of the wet season, wetlands across six countries have become seasonal inland seas, some of them large enough to be visible from orbit. These are the Zambezian flooded grasslands - not a single place, but a scattered archipelago of wetlands threaded across the southern African interior, all tied together by the rhythms of African rains.

Image: Diego Delso | CC BY-SA 4.0

Zambezian flooded grasslands: An Archipelago of Wetlands

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0. The ecoregion runs from northern Botswana, Namibia, and Angola in the west to Tanzania and Mozambique in the east - a broad belt punctuated by places where rivers slow down enough to spread out. The Okavango Delta in Botswana is the best-known fragment, a fan of water that emptie...

Image: Diego Delso | CC BY-SA 4.0

Zambezian flooded grasslands: The Animals That Follow the Water

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0. Floodplain ecology is driven by the pulse of the flood and the grass that follows it. Even through the dry season, enough water remains to support grazing African buffalo, wildebeest, elephants, zebras, and giraffes, along with hippopotamus and crocodiles in the permanent channel...

Image: Diego Delso | CC BY-SA 4.0

Zambezian flooded grasslands: People on the Edge of Water

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0. The floodplains have been home to communities for centuries, despite the challenges - tsetse fly in the bush, malaria in the wet season, soft ground through much of the year. The Lozi people of the Barotse Floodplain have built an entire cultural system around the rhythm of the f...

Image: Diego Delso | CC BY-SA 4.0

Zambezian flooded grasslands: Under Pressure, Under Protection

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diego Delso, CC BY-SA 4.0. The floodplains are mostly unspoilt, but the pressures are real and growing. Poaching targets the larger wildlife. Illegal farming and grazing chip at the edges. Population growth in the surrounding countryside raises demand for water and farmland, and fires are set to clear gras...

Image: Diego Delso | CC BY-SA 4.0