Mgahinga Gorilla National Park

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Entrance to the national park with ranger station 1994
Location of the Mga Hinga north of Sabinyo , Gahinga and Muhabura on a Landsat image, 2007

The Mgahinga Gorilla National Park includes the portion of the Virunga volcanoes in Uganda . Eight isolated, forested and active volcanoes form the Virungas , in which the triangle between Uganda, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo lies. The park is located about 15 km south of the city of Kisoro in the district of the same name and forms a geographical unit with the Virunga National Park and the Volcano National Park , which is known as the Virunga Conservation Area (VCA) and covers an area of ​​434 km².

The main attraction of the national park is - as the name suggests - the rare mountain gorillas . However, since it only takes up 8% of the VCA and also only houses a single gorilla group that is used to humans ("habituated"), it is not a reliable starting point for the "gorilla tracking" popular with tourists, i.e. guided hikes to the assumed current whereabouts of the animals .

Mountain gorilla in the Mgahinga Gorilla National Park

The Bwindi Impenetrable National Park about 60 km north, in which just over 300 representatives of this species live , is therefore more frequented . A sign of the increasing tourist importance of the mountain gorillas for Uganda is the fact that the endangered animals graced the back of the country's highest banknote in 2007 and 2010.

The national park owes its existence to the German zoologist and behavioral researcher Klaus-Jürgen Sucker, who died under mysterious circumstances in Kisoro in 1994 . Sucker headed the Mgahinga Gorilla National Park Project (MGNPP) from 1988 to 1994 . The wildlife sanctuary, formerly called Mgahinga Forest Reserve , received national park status in May 1991. In June 1992 the protected area of ​​only 24.5 km² was expanded to 33.7 km². It was the first and so far only time in the history of mountain gorilla protection that the steadily shrinking habitat of the great apes could be enlarged.

Yellow-bridged bearded bird in the area of ​​Mt.Sabinyo, 2006

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.eastafricannaturesafaris.com/index.php?eans&as=33
  2. ↑ Mirco Lomoth: The day on which Kanyabikingyi returned to his forest. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung , May 27, 2012, pages V4 and V5.
  3. ↑ Uganda's 50,000 Shilling Note Wins Global Award ( Memento from August 5, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  4. ↑ Ron Wise's Banknoteworld: Uganda ( Memento of July 4, 2009 in the Internet Archive )

Web links


Coordinates: 1 ° 22 ′ 0 ″  S , 29 ° 38 ′ 0 ″  E