Amboseli National Park
Template:Short description Template:Use British English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox Protected area Amboseli National Park, formerly Maasai Amboseli Game Reserve, is a national park in Loitoktok District in Kajiado County, Kenya.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> It is Template:Cvt in size at the core of an Template:Cvt ecosystem that spreads across the Kenya-Tanzania border.<ref>Template:Cite webTemplate:Dead link</ref> It harbours 400 species of birds including water birds like pelicans, kingfishers, crakes, hamerkop and 47 raptor species. The local people are mainly Maasai.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>
The park protects two of the five main swamps and includes a dried-up Pleistocene lake and semiarid vegetation.
History
In 1883, Jeremy Thompson was the first European to penetrate the feared Maasai region known as Empusel (meaning 'salty, dusty place' in Maa). He, too, was astonished by the fantastic array of wildlife and the contrast between the arid areas of the dry lake bed and the oasis of the swamps, a contrast that persists today.
Amboseli was set aside as the Southern Reserve for the Maasai in 1906 but returned to local control as a game reserve in 1948. Gazetted a national park in 1974 to protect the core of this unique ecosystem, it was declared a UNESCO site in 1991. The park earned $3.5 M (€2.9 M) in 2005. On 29 September 2005, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki declared that control of the park should pass from the Kenya Wildlife Service to the Olkejuado County Council and the Maasai tribe. Some observers saw this as a political favour in advance of a vote on a new Kenyan constitution; legal challenges are currently in court. The degazetting would divert park admission fees directly to the county council with shared benefits to the Maasai immediately surrounding the park.
Wildlife
Amboseli National Park was home to Echo, the most researched elephant in the world, and the subject of many books and documentaries, followed for almost four decades by American conservationist Cynthia Moss. Echo died in 2009 when she was about 60 years old.<ref name="Elephants in Amboseli">Template:Cite web</ref>
Amboseli National Park is home to African bush elephant, Cape buffalo, impala, lion, cheetah, spotted hyena, Masai giraffe, Grant's zebra, and blue wildebeest. Many large and small birds can also be found.
See also
References
External links
Template:Wikivoyage Template:Commons category Template:National Parks of Kenya