South Africa

C

Coastline

South Africa’s 2,798 km (1,739 mi) of coastline has few bays or coves and only one good natural harbor, at Saldanha Bay in the southwest, which is used mainly for the export of iron ore. Other ports are essentially artificial, including Durban, East London, Port Elizabeth, and Richard’s Bay. The most distinctive promontory on the coast is Cape Peninsula in southwestern South Africa, which ends at the Cape of Good Hope. Coral reefs fringe parts of the eastern coast.

D

Geology and Soils

Underlying the plateaus is a great complex of crystalline rocks. These rocks were worn down over millions of years to form an almost level surface and are covered in places by thick layers of sandstone and shale. The layers are nearly horizontal except in the southwest, where extensive folding has formed irregular hills and mountains. In the Witwatersrand and the Middle Veld the underlying bedrock is exposed.

The major soil zones are conditioned largely by climatic factors. In the semiarid north and west, soils are alkaline and poorly developed. In the southern part of Western Cape Province, rain falls mostly in the winter months, and soils there form slowly and are generally thin and immature. The moderate temperatures and summer rainfall of the High Veld and eastern coastal areas create conditions for more productive organic decomposition, leading to dark, fertile soils, or chernozems, similar to those of the North American prairies. Further north and northeast, where temperatures are high and summer rainfall is relatively heavy, soils are reddish, contain aluminum and iron compounds, and are less fertile.

E

Plant and Animal Life

South Africa has remarkably diverse plant life for a country of its size, comprising thousands of different species, many of them native. Grasslands cover most of the plateau areas, resembling a prairie on the nearly treeless High Veld. The Bush Veld is characterized by savanna vegetation, consisting of mixed grassland with trees and bushes such as the baobab tree in Limpopo Province and the mopani tree in the central Bush Veld. On the Great Karoo and Little Karoo, the grasslands are sparse. Vegetation consists of coarse desert grasses that grow in tufts and become green only after rain. The semidesert Northern Cape is transformed after spring rains with blooming wildflowers in the Namaqualand region.

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About 90,000 sq km (about 30,000 sq mi) of the Cape Peninsula and the southern part of Western Cape Province contain the distinctive fynbos biome (ecological community). Although relatively small in area, this region constitutes one of the six recognized floral kingdoms of the world. It includes 8,500 plant species, of which more than 6,000 are indigenous. This biome is home to the protea, an evergreen shrub for which South Africa is renowned.

The only significant forests in South Africa lie along the coasts of Western Cape and Eastern Cape provinces, although there are patches of protected rain forest in the Eastern Low Veld. Hardwood species such as yellowwood, ironwood, and lemonwood trees are found in these areas, but softwoods are scarce; coniferous pines from Europe and North America have been planted to provide timber and wood pulp.

Numerous large mammals, including lions, elephants, zebras, leopards, monkeys, baboons, hippopotamuses, rhinoceroses, and antelopes, are indigenous to South Africa. For the most part such animals are found only on game reserves. Much of Kruger National Park, the oldest game reserve, was a protected area as early as 1898. It covers an area of 19,485 sq km (7,523 sq mi) along the Mozambique border. Kruger National Park includes nearly every species of indigenous wildlife and is particularly noted for the small black rhino population built up by the National Parks Board. Other notable reserves include Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park (shared with Botswana) in the northwest; Addo Elephant National Park, near Port Elizabeth; and Mountain Zebra National Park, near Cradock. Bird life is abundant and includes the larger birds: ostrich, francolin (a type of partridge), quail, guinea fowl, and grouse. Snakes are common in most of the country.

F

Natural Resources

Only 12 percent of South Africa’s land area is cultivated and only 8 percent is forested, but the country is rich in mineral resources. South Africa is the world’s largest producer of gold, with almost all of it coming from the Witwatersrand. Gold is mined to depths below 3,000 m (10,000 ft), making production expensive. Uranium is also extracted commercially in the Witwatersrand. Vast, easily worked coal seams occur between Lesotho and Swaziland, and South Africa has become a leading coal exporter. Diamonds are another important source of South Africa’s mineral wealth. Most of South Africa’s diamond fields are located in the Kimberley area of Northern Cape. South Africa also has large reserves of chromite, vanadium, andalusite, manganese, platinum, nickel, and fluorite.

G

Climate

South Africa enjoys a generally warm, temperate climate. Most of the country experiences light rainfall and long hours of sunshine.

Rainfall is typically unpredictable. Prolonged droughts often end with severe floods. Only about one-third of the country, including the Eastern Low Veld and the Drakensberg, has an annual rainfall of more than 600 mm (20 in); about half receives from 200 mm to 600 mm (8 to 20 in), including much of the High Veld, where rainfall diminishes rapidly from east to west; the remaining area, in the west, is arid, with less than 200 mm (8 in). Rain falls primarily in summer between October and April. In the drier regions of the plateaus the amount of rainfall and the beginning of the rainy season vary greatly from year to year. The extreme southwest has a Mediterranean climate with westerly winds from the Atlantic bringing winter rainfall mostly between June and September.

Since most of South Africa is at a high elevation, temperatures tend to be lower than those of other regions at similar latitudes. There is a striking difference between temperatures on the east and west coasts. The east coast is influenced by the warm Agulhas Current and the west coast by the cold Benguela Current. This results in a temperature difference of 6°C (11°F) in the mean annual temperatures of the city of Durban on the east coast and Port Nolloth on the west coast, which are at similar latitudes. Average temperature ranges in January are 21° to 27°C (69° to 81°F) in Durban, 14° to 26°C (58° to 78°F) in Johannesburg, and 12° to 34°C (54° to 93°F) in Cape Town. In July the temperature ranges are 11° to 22°C (52° to 72°F) in Durban, 4° to 17°C (39° to 63°F) in Johannesburg, and 4° to 24°C (38° to 76°F) in Cape Town. Snow is rare except in the higher parts of the Drakensberg, but winter frosts occur on the higher parts of the plateau.

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