Wildlife & Birds

Lake Mburo National Park is the best place in Uganda to see klipspringers only living on rocky outcrops and often seen at Mihingo Lodge. Also plains game like zebra and vast amounts of impala and eland can often be found in Lake Mburo National Park, but nowhere else in Uganda. Lake Mburo is also home to more commonly see species like waterbuck, topi, warthog, bushbuck, reedbuck, oribi, vervet monkey, baboon and many types of mongoose.

According to our records Lake Mburo might have the highest leopard concentration ever recorded, due to its perfect leopard habitat and thousands of impala which are leopards’ favourite prey in Mburo. Leopard are mostly seen on night game drives together with the very widespread, but rarely seen bushpig and hyenas. Nightgame drives also reveal the small jennat cats and white tales mongoose.

Encountering buffalo on walking safaris or horse rides is one of the most exciting experiences you can have on a safari.

Lake Mburo is now also home to 15 endangered Rothschild’s giraffe, which were introduced in July 2015. It is exhilarating encountering them on one of our horse safaris.

Another special animal at Mihingo Lodge are the bushbabies (longtailed galago) which come nearly every night to the bushbaby platform below the bar area. This is one of the only places in Africa to see this very shy nocturnal primate close up.

The large variety of habitats in Lake Mburo National Park supports over 350 bird species including rare, but regularly seen species like African finfoot and white-backed heron. If you are able to call the papyrus gonolek using a recorded bird call, it will come to the edge of the papyrus, otherwise this papyrus endemic species is rarely seen. If you are lucky you might see a shoebill and in the rainy season the grey crowned cranes breed and raise their fluffy chicks in the swampy areas of the valleys.

Lake Mburo is also home to a huge number of African fish eagles. There is a large variety of savannah and water birds including some spectacular species like Narina trogon, Ross’s turaco, African green-pigeon and the bare-faced go-away-bird often seen around Mihingo Lodge. If you ask one of our guides you can try and track one of the Narina trogon’s. When you hear their calls a guide can take you close to the area it is calling and with a bit of luck you can spot this very elusive and beautiful little bird. With a recorded bird call it is quite easy to see them as they will come to see who has invaded their territory.

Mihingo Bird List