8 Of The Best Top Birding Sites In Uganda

Best known to wildlife enthusiasts for its mountain gorillas, Uganda also ranks among Africa’s most biodiverse countries, thanks to an equatorial location at the transition of the eastern savanna, western rainforest, and northern semi-deserts.

- Philip Briggs

Geographic landmarks include the snow-capped 5190-metre Rwenzori (aka the legendary Mountains of the Moon), the immense inland sea known as Lake Victoria and the associated source of the Nile, and the spectacular volcanic cones of the Virungas. A network of 10 national parks protects not only the gorillas for which Uganda is renowned, but also plentiful chimpanzees, more than a dozen monkey species, the tree-climbing lions of Ishasha and significant numbers of elephants, hippos, buffaloes and various antelope.

Uganda can also stake a fair claim to being Africa’s best all-round birding destination. This is largely due to its extraordinary avian diversity – a mind-boggling 1075 species in an area similar to that of Great Britain – but also because it offers easy access to several bird-rich habitats difficult to reach elsewhere on the continent. True, Uganda’s transitional location means that it boasts just one or possibly two national endemics (Fox’s Weaver, associated with waterside vegetation in the south-east, and Rwenzori Double-collared Sunbird, an Albertine Rift endemic whose range might now be limited to the Ugandan slopes of the Rwenzori). But in the broader East African context, approximately 150 bird species (more than 10 per cent of the regional checklist) have a range restricted to Uganda, a list that includes dozens of Albertine Riftor Guinea–Congo endemics whose range is otherwise confined to parts of the Congo that might generously be described as difficult to access.

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