Southern Congolian forest-savanna mosaic


The southern Congolian forest-savanna mosaic is an ecoregion that covers a large area of the southern Democratic Republic of the Congo and northeastern Angola. Its rich blend of habitats provides key insights into the biogeography of central Africa with the extensive climatic variation that it has been experiencing for the last 10 million years. The human population is not high.

Geography

The Southern Congolian forest-savanna mosaic is a transitional region between the equatorial Congolian forests region to the north and the woodlands and savannas of the Zambezian region to the south. The Central Congolian lowland forests lie to the north, west of the Congo River, and the Northeastern Congolian lowland forests are east of the Congo. In the highlands to the east are the Albertine Rift montane forests. The Central Zambezian miombo woodlands lie to the southeast, and the Angolan miombo woodlands to the southwest. To the west is the Western Congolian forest-savanna mosaic.
Central Africa is familiar with repeated climatic variation that have caused rain forest and savanna expansion and deflation in consideration of the late Pleistocene tectonics defined the Congo Basin. Important climatic shifts have occurred more than 20 times in less than 10 million years. Plants and animals adapt, change, and go extinct with any climatic oscillation. Widespread and immensely resilient organisms that lived through in islands of habitat and accustomed to spatial fluidity were favored. During dry periods, savanna communities breached far into the Congo Basin. The relatively moist riparian forests become detached from one another and compose forest island localities in the savanna matrix.

Fauna

The ecoregion is home to African bush elephants.

Conservation and threats

The political situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is unstable; until the country is stable, no important conservation work is likely.

Protected areas

A 2017 assessment found that 19,841 km², or 4% of the ecoregion is in protected areas. Protected areas include Mangai Nature Reserve, and Bushimaie Hunting Reserve.