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Limpopo lowveld
Limpopo lowveld
RESOLVE 48
The Limpopo Lowveld is a tropical, summer-rainfall savanna ecoregion forming a low-lying belt that runs from just south of Eswatini up to the Mozambique–South African border, spanning parts of Mozambique, Eswatini, and South Africa at an average elevation of around 450 metres. Its characteristic vegetation is open savanna and bushveld in which winter-deciduous mopane (Colophospermum mopane) and Acacia trees rise above a grassy understory, the distribution of woody cover shaped by rainfall, fire, and elephant browsing. The climate is warm and strongly seasonal, with rain concentrated in the summer wet season from roughly October to May and a long dry winter. The ecoregion is one of the world's key strongholds for southern white and south-central black rhinoceros and supports significant populations of elephant, hippopotamus, buffalo, giraffe, greater kudu, and nyala, much of it safeguarded within Kruger National Park and the Vhembe Biosphere Reserve. For gardeners in comparable warm, summer-rainfall climates, hardy native trees such as mopane and the indigenous Acacia species evoke this landscape.
Limpopo lowveld location on world map
Marker placed inside the RESOLVE 2017 polygon at 25.3°S, 31.7°E.
Climate snapshot for this ecoregion
Current zone range (2011–2040)
10b-13b
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CHELSA-derived typical winter month at this ecoregion's bbox grid.
Projected (2041–2070)
11a-13b
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Where the CHELSA models say the typical winter month is heading.
Average warming this ecoregion is on track for: +3.8°F by mid-century. SSP3-7.0 (current trajectory) · CHELSA v2.1 bio06 sampled across 10 of 10 points within this ecoregion's bounding box.
At a glance
Dominant biome
Tropical & Subtropical Grasslands, Savannas & Shrublands
Realm
Afrotropic
Approximate area
31,743 sq mi
Conservation tier
Nature Could Recover (Dinerstein NNH 3)
About the tropical & subtropical grasslands, savannas & shrublands biome
Warm grasslands and savannas where grasses dominate and trees are scattered, maintained by seasonal rainfall, grazing, and fire. They support large herbivore communities and respond sharply to wet–dry cycles.
Catalog plants suited to this ecoregion
Computed from each plant's stated USDA zone range against this ecoregion's CHELSA-derived current zone range, with the CHELSA mid-century warming delta applied for the projection. Plants whose stated range falls outside both the current and projected zone end up dropped; the rest land in one of the three buckets below.
Collections for this ecoregion
No curated collection's plants all fit this ecoregion's zone range. We surface a collection only when every member would grow here — partial fits get filtered out rather than mislead. As the catalog and the curated set both grow, this section will fill in.
Sources
Summary drawn from One Earth, Britannica.
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