Mkomazi National Park is home to more than 400 species of bird, a number of which are endemic to this area of Tanzania. These endemic species include the Violet Wood-hoopoe, Friedmann’s Lark, the Somali Long-billed Crombec and the Yellow-vented Eremomela. Mkomazi being the most southern extension of the Somali semi-arid belt is believed to be the reason these species are recorded here and nowhere else in Tanzania.
Particularly birds of prey and ground birds are abundant in Mkomazi and some of the best sites for bird watching in Mkomazi are Zange, Dindira, Mbula, Babus, Norbanda, Ngurunga and Maore.
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Common Ostrich – a group of youngsters
Black-bellied Sunbird
Paradise Flycatcher (white morph)
African Orange-bellied Parrot
Black-shouldered Kite
Eastern Chanting-Goshawk
Pangani Longclaw
Red-headed Weaver
White-browed Coucal
Brown-crowned Tchagra
Greater Honeyguide (juv)
Red-and-yellow Barbet
Long-crested Eagle
Heuglin’s Courser
Tawny Eagle (Juv)Vegetation
Mkomazi National Park lies at the southern end of the sahelian Acacia-Commiphora savanna and the local flora is enriched by the area’s high physiographic diversity: in the West and South it is surrounded by the Pare and Usambara Mountains, and it is close to the coastal vegetation of northern Tanzania.
Checklist of common trees of Mkomazi National Park
- Lannea Schweinfurthii (False Marula)
- Lannea triphylla
- Cordia monoica (snot berry)
- Commiphora africana (African myrhh)
- Commiphora habessinica (Abyssinian myrrh)
- Commiphora holtziana
- Commiphora shimperi (glossy-leaved corkwood)
- Boscia salicifolia (willow-leafed shephard’s tree)
- Maerua triphylla (small bead-bean)
- Maytenus senegalensis (spike thorn)
- Combretum exalatum
- Combretum molle (velvet bushwillow)
- Combretum zeyheri (large-fruited bushwillow)
- Terminilia kilimandscharica
- Terminalia prunioides (purple-pod terminalia)
- Terminalia sambesiaca (river terminalia)
- Terminalia spinosa (spiny terminalia)
- Cassia singueana (sticky pod)
- Delonix elata (creamy peacock flower
- Tamarindus indica (Indian tamarind)
- Acacia etbaica
- Acacia mellifera (black thorn)
- Acacia nilotica (gum arabic tree)
- Acacia Senegal (gum acacia)
- Dichrostachys cinerea (sickle bush, chinese lantern)
- Craibia previcaudata
- Dalbergia melanoxylon (African blackwood)
- Lonchocarpus eriocalyx (broad lance-pod)
- Ormocarpum kirkii (caterpillar bush)
- Xeroclerris stuhlmannii (wing pod)
- Apodytes dimitiata (white pear)
- Hoslundia opposita (orange bird-berry)
- Nuxia floribunda (forest elder)
- Strychnos henningsii (red bitter berry)
- Melia volkensii (Melia tree)
- Turraea floribunda (honeysuckle tree)
- Ficus bubu (sulphur-barked fig)
- Ficus bussei (Zambezi fig)
- Ficus glumosa (mountain rock fig)
- Ficus ingens (red-leaved fig)
- Ficus sansibarica (knobby fig)
- Ficus Stuhlmannii (lowveld fig)
- Ficus sycomorus (Sycamore fig)
- Chionanthus battiscombei (small fruited ironwood)