Hluhluwe-Imfolozipark
Reputedly Kind Shaka’s favourite hunting ground, Zululand’s Hluhluwe-Imfolozi incorporates two of Africa’s oldest reserves: Hluhluwe and Imfolozi, both founded in 1895. In an area of just 906km², Hluhluwe-Imfolozi delivers the Big Five plus all the plains game and species like nyala and red duiker that are rare in other parts of the country. Equally important, it boasts one of the most biologically diverse habitats on the planet, a unique mix of forest, woodland, savannah, and grassland. You’ll find about 1 250 species of plants and trees here – more than in some entire countries.
Thanks to the conservations efforts and those of its predecessor, the highly regarded Natal Parks Board; the park can take credit for saving the white rhino from extinction.
Hluhluwe is named after the umHluhluwe or ‘thorny rope’, a climber which is found in the forests of this area. The aerial roots hanging from the sycamore figs where the Black Imfolozi and White Imfolozi rivers meet, give the area its name.
Imfolozi is named after ‘uMfula walosi’ or ‘river of fibres’. The park has a variety of landscapes – thick forests, dry bushveld and open savannah – that are home to a number of species of game, including healthy populations of rhino and rare nyala. What is unusual about the park is the hilly terrain, which provides a great vantage point for game viewing.
Hluhluwe is a small village in an area surrounded by large luxury game farms. It is a good base to explore the region as it is within easy reach of many of the local game parks and is only 15km from St Lucia’s False Bay.
The biggest conservation success story for Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is the white rhino, which has been brought back from the brink of extinction. It is estimated that in the later 1800s when the reserve was proclaimed, the entire world population of southern white rhinos was only 20, all of them living in this area. Southern Africa is the genetic home for the white rhino and all populations in the world have their origins here.
The rhino’s early protection from hunting, allowed numbers to grow to such an extent that, since the 1950s, surplus rhino have been transferred to other areas as part of the internationally famous ‘Operations Rhino’. As a result, the populations of white rhino in South Africa has grown from around 500 in the 1950s to 6000 today, and the global population is put at about 13 000.
Hluhluwe-Imfolozi is now focusing on saving the black rhino, whose numbers in Africa over the last decade have dwindled from 14 000 to a mere 1 550. Kwa-Zulu Natal (KZN) Wildlife is currently working with the WWF on the Black Rhino Range Expansion Project, suitable conservation areas with surplus black rhinos from KZN Wildlife reserves. At least a quarter of the world’s population of black and white rhino are found in Hluhluwe-Imfolozi.