African animals in U.S. zoos

Why Africa's wildlife is so rich

Africa straddles the equator and lies almost entirely within the tropics, which favors both variety and abundance of wildlife. Its tropical position also spared it from Pleistocene glaciations, and the continent shows much less evidence of loss in the Pleistocene megafaunal extinction. One suggested reason is that its large animals evolved alongside early humans and had time to develop defenses.

Long isolation after the breakup of Gondwana left Africa with lineages found nowhere else. Three mammal orders are endemic, including the Tubulidentata, whose only living member is the aardvark. Despite its pig-like snout, the aardvark's closest relatives are elephant shrews, tenrecs and golden moles in the group Afrotheria. Africa also has a longer list of hoofed mammals than any other continent and the largest number of living bovids, from duikers and impala to wildebeest and the eland.

Savanna, rainforest and desert

The East African plains are famous for their diversity of large mammals. Dry grasslands hide less obvious residents too: the naked mole-rat lives underground in colonies with breeding and non-breeding castes, a system otherwise associated with ants and termites, and it can live more than 37 years.

Central Africa's forests hold a different cast. The okapi, whose striped legs suggest a zebra, is actually the giraffe's only living relative and lives in the canopy forest of the northeast Democratic Republic of the Congo. All four of Africa's great apes are endemic to the continent: two gorillas, the chimpanzee and the bonobo. Today's forest fauna has a double origin, descended partly from ancient forest species and partly from steppe animals that adapted to forest life.

Birds and fish

More than 2,600 bird species live in Africa at least part of the year. Ostriches, guineafowl and mousebirds belong to families found only in the Afrotropics. The ostrich is the largest living bird, and the helmeted guineafowl is the best-known member of its family. Africa is also the main winter destination for Palearctic birds: of the species that leave temperate Europe and Asia for winter, 98 percent fly south to Africa.

Africa is the richest continent for freshwater fish, with about 3,000 species. The East African Great Lakes hold more than two-thirds of the world's estimated 2,000 cichlid species.

Animals under pressure

Several of the continent's best-known animals are in steep decline. The black rhinoceros is Critically Endangered, with poaching and habitat loss the main threats and three subspecies already declared extinct. The African penguin was reclassified as Critically Endangered in 2023, hit by overfishing of the sardines and anchovies it eats, habitat loss, climate change and oil spills. The okapi faces logging, bushmeat hunting, illegal mining and armed groups that block conservation work.

Recovery is possible. The scimitar-horned oryx was declared extinct in the wild in 2000, survived in captive-breeding programs, and returned to Endangered in 2023 after a reintroduction in Chad. Amphibians are also at risk: an IUCN-led assessment found that only about half of Afrotropical amphibians are of least concern.