This camp is famous for its high predator density, as well as the concession being home to large numbers of lion and buffalo whose interactions have been documented many times. You will then fly south to Gomoti Plains Camp where you will spend 3 nights doing a mixture of game drives, guided walks and taking mokoro trips along the waterways. Gomoti Plains is also known for its big cats and rhino sightings so your best chances of ticking these of will be here.
Your final camp is down in the Makgadikgadi National Park and was also my home for 2 years whilst I was working as a guide there. This is undoubtedly one of the most well known camps in Africa and once you have arrived you will understand why. Having recently undergone a full refurbishment it is the epitome of luxury in one of the most interesting areas in Africa. The desert adapted game here includes Kalahari black maned lion, aardwolf and he illusive brown hyena, here you have a very good chance of seeing all three.
Jacks Camp is also in the heart of the Zebra migration between December and March with views across the pans and surrounding grasslands you can sit there and read or relax on your decking whilst watching the migration slowly move past. Find out more about making this trip your own.
I would suggest taking the usual safari essentials such as camera, mosquito repellent, sturdy boots for walking and clothing with neutral colours, but most of all a good pair of binoculars to scan across the opens expanses are very useful. Wondering when to visit Botswana?
Take a look at this guide on the best time to visit Botswana. Looking for some more inspiration? Take a look at our best safari holidays ideas , our favourite family safaris , our big five safari guide or our top African safari honeymoon suggestions. It may not be the largest migration, but it is the most intriguing and truly beautiful, especially when set against the water reflective salt pans of the Makgadikgadi.
Have a look at our original holiday experiences and then contact us with your brief, or call Our experts will send you a detailed holiday itinerary within 24 hours. It's our service promise to you. Tailor-made doesn't mean expensive! View More. Migration updates Subscribe to our newsletter. Email Address. In the late s, Botswana entered into an agreement with the European Union to provide cattle for food purposes, but while this deal may have been lucrative at the time, it came with stringent conditions.
One of these was that Botswana needed to take measures to avoid the transmission of foot-and-mouth disease between wild animals and domestic cattle. Thus, a series of veterinary fences were erected that separated swathes of land and cut off the pre-existing migratory routes.
When these fences were moved in the mids, researchers and conservationists were astounded to see a portion of the zebra herds begin to follow two ancient migratory patterns: the Chobe-Nxai Pan and Okavango-Makgadikgadi migratory routes. While there has been plenty of anecdotal evidence as to the seasonal movement of various animals in Botswana, it was only in that researchers confirmed through the use of tracking collars that the zebras were completing an unexpectedly long return journey of over 1,km each year.
The herds spend the harshest of the dry months around the Chobe River flood plains from June until early November, before massing in early December, when over 20, zebras begin their journey southwards — triggered by rain in the Nxai Pan area. The moving red area represents the main herds.
Some of the zebras from Chobe stop over temporarily, en route, at Seloko Plain. By end-March: the last zebra herds are heading north and west. April to early July zebra herds arrive in the Okavango and Chobe areas.
Surprisingly, this is along a relatively linear path, with groups of animals apparently bypassing perfectly good alternative destinations along the way. This migration has only been discovered so recently because much of the country it goes through is virtually inaccessible, and nobody thought that zebras would ever travel such a long way. Nxai pan migration: month by month The zebras studied in this first research on this migration stay in the floodplains of the Chobe River and its surroundings in both Namibia and Botswana during the dry season: July, August, September, October and perhaps early November.
In this part of the world, the annual rains start around the end-November, or the beginning of December. However, the time at which the zebra depart from this area appears to be related to the arrival of rainfall in the Nxai Pan area — some km to the south.
When it rains in Nxai, the zebra start moving southwards. Most of the zebra travel in a direct straight line to Nxai Pan, although some stop over temporarily at Seloko Plain before continuing on to Nxai Pan. Their journey covers about km, and typically takes them days. That means that the round-trip, straight-line migration distance is the longest distance covered by any African land migration, longer than even the famous Serengeti migration in Tanzania and Kenya. The study indicates that these animals stay for around 80 days in the Nxai Pan National Park — typically during December, January and February.
They mostly stay in the pan itself, but some also explore the surrounding grasslands. The zebras then start their return journey at the end of February or in early March. Most of the zebras take around 80 days to return to the northern riverfront area of Chobe National Pak, and typically travel about km to get there. Depending on the return route, the zebra arrive around the Chobe Riverfront area in April, May, June or even early July , where they stay until around December — before starting their journey again.
The Makgadikgadi zebra migration In recent years, Botswana has again started to host another smaller zebra migration, which travels a similar distance at a similar time. Anecdotal evidences from the first half of the Twentieth Century points to the existence of a zebra migration covering about km from the south-eastern Okavango Delta to the grasslands of the Makgadikgadi Pan National Park. However, in the s and 60s, Botswana put up a series of extensive veterinary fences.
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