Queen Elizabeth National Park: A Biodiversity Haven of Wildlife and Birdlife in Uganda

Queen Elizabeth National Park: A Biodiversity Haven of Wildlife and Birdlife in Uganda. Queen Elizabeth National Park is one of Uganda’s most biodiverse conservation areas, home to over 95 mammal species and an impressive, world-renowned list of over 600 bird species. The park also boasts 10 primate species, including chimpanzees.

Key Wildlife & Species Highlights

Mammals: Over 95 species, including four of the “Big Five” (lion, leopard, elephant, buffalo). It is famous for the tree-climbing lions in the Ishasha sector.

Birds: Over 600 to 612 species, including the rare shoebill stork, flamingos, and African fish eagles.

Primates: 10 species present, including chimpanzees, black-and-white colobus monkeys, and baboons.

Aquatic Life: Large concentrations of hippos and Nile crocodiles inhabit the Kazinga Channel.

Other Key Animals: Uganda kobs, waterbucks, giant forest hogs, and sitatungas.

With over 600 bird species, it is recognized as a top birding destination in East Africa, surpassed only by the neighboring Virunga National Park.

Uganda Wild Animals in Queen Elizabeth National Park-Wildlife Species/Animals of Uganda

Uganda wild animals in Queen Elizabeth National Park- wildlife species/animals of Uganda are widely recognized to be highly concentrated in one place.

A census in the 1970s revealed that this park harbored the highest quantity of herbivores on planet earth!

Queen Elizabeth National Park has outstanding wildlife attractions and this is the magnet that pulls tourists to Uganda. The park is home to 95 mammal species while the bird list is 612 species long. This diversity is the result of an impressive range of habitats. Fifty-seven vegetation types have been identified though these can be summarized as just five: forest; grassland; bushy grassland; Acacia woodland and lake shore/ swamp vegetation.

Residents of the park’s grasslands include elephant, Cape buffalo, Uganda kob, waterbuck, warthog, giant forest hog, lion, leopard and hyena. Topi are found in Ishasha, while forest primates are found in Kyambura Gorge and Maramagambo Forest.

In African protected areas, the park’s impressive bird list is exceeded only by the neighboring (and far larger) Virunga National Park.
To name but a few key species: martial eagle, black-rumped buttonquail, African skimmer, Chapin’s flycatcher, pink-backed pelicans, white-winged warbler, papyrus gonolek, papyrus canary, corncrake, lesser and greater flamingo, and shoebill stork.

Big Game

With an astonishing 5000 hippos, 2500 elephants and over 10,000 buffalo thriving in its grasslands and shorelines, Queen Elizabeth National Park guarantees sightings of some of Africa’s most iconic
species. The hippos spend their days escaping the burning equatorial sunshine in the cool waters of the park’s lakes and channels, before setting off across the savannah at dusk to munch their way through up
to 50kg of vegetation before sunrise. Elephants, too, congregate around the waterways, but these huge, hungry creatures, standing up to 3.5 metres tall and weighing up to 6000kg need to wander far and wide in search of vegetation to sustain them. Families of 10-15 individuals, and in some cases many more, wade across swamps and trample through forests, and their loud calls can be heard resonating across the crater filled valleys.

Other common herbivores include warthogs, waterbuck, Uganda kob and topi, as well as the shy sitatunga antelope.

Wildlife highlights in Queen Elizabeth National Park

This park is filled with diverse flora and fauna including the famous Big Five game animals. Apart from these, you will get to enjoy immense bird watching, rock climbing, and indulging yourself in the local tradition and culture of the friendly local people. Below is a highlight of the famous Big Five of Queen Elizabeth National Park.

African Elephants

Scientifically known as Loxodonta Africana, these majestic mammals are located in the Queen Elizabeth National Park wilderness. These large animals are mostly herbivores with thick and flexible long trunks with a long upper incisor tooth. Additionally, these African elephants have corn shaped ears looking like the map of Africa.

These elephants camouflage in the tall savanna landscape of the park. The African elephants are unique in this part of the world making them a huge attraction for anyone looking forward to a true African safari. Luckily, Uganda hosts more than 5000 of the estimated 600,000 remaining elephants on the continent.

Ishasha Tree Climbing Lions

It is unusual for lions to climb trees and such lions are no more than two populations in the world during their daily life. Fortunately, you can get a chance to catch rare sights of these tree-climbing lions during a Queen Elizabeth National Park safari. These lions supposedly climb trees to protect themselves from tsetse flies or to enjoy the cool breeze away from the heat on the ground.

You can watch these lions lazily lying in the branches of huge fig trees ogling down at the multiple Uganda Kobs grazing in the Isasha plains. In the afternoon, the tree-climbing lions sleep on branches high up in the tress to digest their lunch.

Cape Buffaloes

This tremendously big animal is another attraction on a Queen Elizabeth National Park safari. Cape buffaloes are communal animals living in large herds of about 2000. In addition, the sexes have a hierarchy with males having dominance over the females. Keep in mind that Cape buffaloes can be dangerous especially when wounded.

Nocturnal Leopards

Scientifically known as Panthera Pardus, the leopards are carnivorous animals belonging to the cat family. African leopards in Queen Elizabeth National Park are nocturnal and fierce. The best sights of these leopards are during a nocturnal game safari. Keep in mind that the number of surviving leopards in Africa is less than 700,000.

Birds

Many people visit Queen Elizabeth National Park specifically for the birds.  Not a lot of places can boast a species list this long.  At over 600 species, it offers the widest variety of species of any protected area in East Africa.  As infrastructure in the country has improved, Uganda has earned a well-deserved reputation as a birding hotspot, with plenty of qualified and knowledgeable guides being available.  Enthusiastic birders come from all over the world for their chance to see the elusive Shoebill stork, as well as the prolific variety of other water birds that live along the Kazinga Channel between Lakes Edward and George.  On one of my trips to the park, I spent the better part of the day with a serious birder from England.  He spent most of the morning at Mweya Lodge, glued to the end of his spotting scope and actually squealed with joy when he saw African Skimmers dipping in the water on the channel. It was a new tick in the box for him and he was overjoyed.  On the afternoon boat trip up the Kazinga Channel, once again, he was overwhelmed with the number of species to be seen.  By evening he was smiling from ear to ear and said it had been an extremely successful trip to Queen Elizabeth, I am certain that his experience is not unusual.

Primates

A number of primate species live in Queen Elizabeth National Park, the most popular of them being the chimpanzee, which can be tracked in the Kyambura Gorge. Diurnal species that live in the park are black and white colobus monkey, red tailed monkey, blue monkey, chimpanzee, L’hoest’s monkey and vervet monkey.  Thick tailed Gallagos more commonly known as Bush Babies and Potto are the park’s nocturnal species.

Listings of Uganda’s Wildlife

Here you can learn about all your favorite animals, and even some you may have never heard of! Follow the links below to learn about some of the wildlife found in Uganda. I have tried to include interesting facts and behavioral information with the hopes that people planning safaris will realize that the cats are not the ONLY interesting animals out there!

You will be richly rewarded if you spend some time watching herds of antelopes to try to determine dominance hierarchies, watching mixed groupings of animals to see the ways that they interact cross-species, and even watching a grouping (called a “tower”) of giraffes to see if you can determine genders just by observing where they are feeding in the acacia trees.

In many of the animal accounts, the basic information is at the beginning presented in an informal way.  For those wanting to go a bit deeper into the behaviors, read down in the “Detailed Information” section, which has a lot of information from The Behavior Guide to African Mammals and a few other sources, all referenced in the text.

• African Elephant
• Banded Mongoose
• Black-and-White Colobus Monkey
• Cape Buffalo
• Hartebeest
• Hippopotamus
• Leopard
• Lion
• Oribi
• Rothschild’s Giraffe
• Spotted Hyaena
• Uganda Kob
• Vervet Monkey
• Warthog
• Waterbuck
• Warthogs
• Baboons
• Hippos
• Crocodiles
• Antelope

Richard Estes’ amazing resource provided a great deal of the technical details on the species. If you wish to learn more about the activities of African wildlife, you must read this book:

The remaining data comes from my personal observations, information that guides at other national parks have shared with me, and the occasional website. Many of the images, including those on this page, are mine. It’s most likely from the fantastic collection if you see one in the animal accounts that truly grabs your attention.

Uganda’s Queen Elizabeth National Park is home to a wide variety of animals. It was designated as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in part because of this.

Species

The park boasts over 95 mammal species, which vindicates it as one of the best Uganda safari parks to experience the wildlife of Uganda.

Four of the “big five” wild animals of Africa also settle in Queen Elizabeth National Park. They are the Lions, African Elephants, African Buffaloes, and Leopards.

Tree-climbing lions and Hippos are the most acknowledged wild animals in this park by Uganda tourists. This is because the park is one of the only two places in the world where there are tree-climbing lions. The second destination is Lake Manyara National Park in Tanzania.

Queen Elizabeth National Park has over 76 lions out of the estimated 400 in Uganda! These lions are both tree-climbing and ground-dwelling.

Moreover, it was declared a lion conservation unit in 2006 by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, IUCN. This was one of the ways to protect the tree-climbing lions from human-lion conflicts.

In addition, the park hosts the highest world concentration of Hippos in one place that is, at the Kazinga Channel. There are over 5000 Hippos stretched in this stream.

The Elephant population has also grown to over 4000 and the Buffaloes to over 1700.

This shows how the park healed over the years from the extreme poaching of previous nationally unstable years. Consequently, wildlife safaris in Uganda have also improved because of this stability.

Other wildlife in Queen Elizabeth National Park is the large herds of Antelopes.

This includes the Royal antelope which is the smallest in the world. Others are the endangered Chimpanzees and nine other primate species.

Other than mammals, Queen Elizabeth National Park also hosts many reptiles like the Nile Crocodiles and many Amphibians too.

You can experience Uganda wildlife tours in Queen Elizabeth

A boat ride at Kazinga Channel and a safari wildlife drive in National Park.

The immense expanse of wetlands, swamps, savannah woods, tropical forests, and grassy plains is home to a diverse variety of wild creatures.

The Kasenyi area, the Ishasha sector, the Kazinga Channel area, the Maramagambo Forest area, the Mweya Peninsula, and the Kyambura Gorge area are a few of these sectors.

The highest number of animals in Queen Elizabeth National Park is in the Kasenyi plains.

The lions that climb trees can be found in Ishasha Queen Elizabeth National Park. On the other side, chimpanzees are protected by the Kyambura Wildlife Reserve in the Kyambura Gorge.

The fact that Queen Elizabeth National Park is a “medley of wonders” cannot be denied. The park plays a significant role in your wildlife safaris in Uganda.

The mammals that can be found in Queen Elizabeth National Park are broken out below.

Queen Elizabeth National Park Wildlife in Uganda | Animal List in Queen Elizabeth National Park

Which creatures can be found at Queen Elizabeth National Park? The park showcases Uganda’s priceless wildlife.

The most well-known creatures in Queen Elizabeth National Park in Uganda, Africa, are listed below.

Carnivores

1. Lions
2. Side-Striped Jackal
3. Leopards
4. Serval Cats
5. Spotted Hyenas
6. African Civets

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