Kinangop Grasslands Kenya: A birds paradise now lost to farming

Africa Climate Conversations.

About an hour and a half drive from Kenya's capital city Nairobi exists the Kinangop Plateau. It is the middle catchment area between the Aberdares /Nyandarua range of mountains and Lake Naivasha. Initially, the grassland was a 70 000 hectares of expansive treeless tussocky grasses, bogs and marshlands. Today, only less than 10 percent of the grassland remains. The land converted into agricultural land, now is a significant source of cabbages, potatoes, and carrots consumed in Nairobi, Naivasha and Gilgil town. Eucalyptus, pines and cyprus trees were grown to rid the land of the water-logged marshes and bogs. As a result, tributaries and rivers flowing into lake Naivasha have lost over 80 percent of water, as observed during the Horn of Africa's longest drought. Why were these grasslands important? why is the land use change a threat to the Sharpe's Long claw birds habitats and survival? Can they be rehabilitated back to near original states amid the demand for food as population and temperatures rise? Click to listen.