Lake Nakuru

Lake Nakuru National Park (188 km², 73 mi²) was created in 1961 around Lake Nakuru, near Nakuru Town. It is best known for its thousands, sometimes millions of flamingos ^[7] nesting along the shores. The surface of the shallow lake is often hardly recognizable due to the continually shifting mass of pink. The number of flamingos on the lake varies with water and food conditions ^[8] and the best vantage point is from Baboon Cliff. Also, of interest is an area of 188 km (117 mi) around the lake fenced off as a sanctuary to protect giraffes as well as both black and white rhinos.

The park has recently been enlarged partly to provide a sanctuary for black rhinos. This endeavour has necessitated a fence – to keep out poachers rather than to restrict the movement of wildlife. The park stretches for 12.1 km (7.5 mi) on the south eastern boundary with the Soysambu Conservancy, which represents a possible future expansion of habitat for the rhinos and the only remaining wildlife corridor to Lake Naivasha.

In 2009, the park had more than 25 eastern black rhinoceros, one of the largest concentrations in the country, plus around 70 southern white rhinos. There are also a number of Rothschild's giraffe, again relocated for safety from western Kenya beginning in 1977. Waterbuck are very common and both the Kenyan subspecies are found here. Among the predators are lions, cheetahs and leopards, the latter being seen much more frequently in recent times. The park also has large sized pythons that inhabit the dense woodlands, and can often be seen crossing the roads or dangling from trees.^[9]

As well as flamingos, there are a myriad of other bird species that inhabit the lake and the area surrounding it, such as African fish eagle, Goliath heron, hamerkop, pied kingfisher and Verreaux's eagle among others of their kind.

Lake Nakuru, a small (varying from 5 to 45 square kilometres [1.9 to 17.4 sq mi]) shallow alkaline lake on the southern edge of the town of Nakuru lies about 164 kilometres (102 mi) north of Nairobi. The lake is world-famous as the location of one of the greatest bird spectacles on earth – myriads of fuchsia pink flamingos, of which there are often more than a million, or even two million.^[10] They feed on the abundant algae, which thrives in the warm waters. Scientists reckon that the flamingo population at Nakuru consumes about 250,000 kg (550,000 lb) of algae per hectare of surface area per year.

There are two types of flamingo species: the lesser flamingo (shorter and lighter) and the greater flamingo (taller and darker). The lesser flamingos are more commonly pictured in documentaries mainly because their larger numbers. The number of flamingos has been decreasing recently^[when?], possibly due to too much tourism or by pollution resulting from industrial waste dumping into the water sources in the surrounding area – changes in water quality make the lake temporarily inhospitable for flamingoes. Usually, the lake recedes during the dry season and floods during the wet season.^[11][12]

Since 1975, there have been wide variations between the dry and wet seasons' water levels. In the 1990’s, the water level of the site plunged dramatically. Then in 2013, it received a very large increase in water levels. Between 2013 and 2020, its surface area temporarily expanded from 15.4 sq mi (40 sq km) to 26.3 sq mi (68 sq km). This resulted in the flooding of hundreds of park areas and local homes.^[10][13]

It is suspected that these changes are caused by increasing watershed land conversion to intensive crop production and urbanization, both which reduce the capacity of soils to absorb water, recharge ground water and thus increase seasonal flooding.^[14]

Pollution and drought destroy the flamingos' food, Cyanobacteria called blue-green algae, causing them to migrate to the nearby Lakes, more recently Lakes Elementaita, Simbi Nyaima and Bogoria.^[15]

Local climate changes have also been hypothesized to contribute to the changing environmental conditions in the lakes catchment. Media reports in 1991 indicated increasing concern among stakeholders, as mass flamingo migrations and deaths could spell doom to the tourism industry.^[16] In 2024, Kenyan court decisions press on the local water treatment facility and named officials to clean up the discharges that affect Lake Nakuru Basin.^[17]

The flamingos feed on algae, created from their droppings into the warm alkaline waters, and plankton. But flamingo are not the only avian attraction; also present are two large fish eating birds, pelicans and cormorants. Despite the tepid and alkaline waters, a diminutive fish, Alcolapia grahami has flourished after being introduced in the early 1960s.^[18]

The lake is rich in other bird life too. There are over 400 resident species on the lake and in the surrounding park.^[19] Thousands of both little grebes and white winged black terns are frequently seen as are stilts, avocets, ducks, and in the European winter the migrant waders.

Zooplankton are present in this lake, part of the food for birds. The monogonont rotifer species Brachionus sp. Austria (belonging to the Brachionus plicatilis cryptic species complex) occurs in the lake.

Tourists can visit this lake in a day tour from the capital or more likely as part of a circuit including the Masai Mara (Also Maasai Mara) or Lake Baringo and eastwards up to Samburu.

The land surrounding Lake Nakuru is home to a variety of wildlife, especially species found only on the African continent.

Counts of species began in 1970 to assess the variety and extent of the animals in the park and note declines or increases over time.^[20]

Black and white rhinos thrive in the surrounding national park in the reserved area for rhinos. They are fenced to limit poaching. Also seen are Cape buffalo, African wild dog, zebra, eland and waterbuck.^[21]

There have been leopard sightings, and of the rare Rothschild’s giraffe. Its acacia and euphorbia forests are havens for animals during the heat of the day. The hippo pool allows viewing of that species.^[21]

• Rift Valley lakes
• Great Rift Valley
• Rivers of Kenya
• Lake Nshenyi

• "Lake Nakuru Sopa Lodge". Sopa Lodges. Retrieved February 19, 2025.

• "Sarova Mara Game Camp". Sarovo Mara. Maasai Mara National Reserve. Retrieved February 19, 2025.</ref>
• "Lakira Camp". Shadows of Africa. Retrieved February 19, 2025.
• "The Cliff Nakuru tent camp". The Wilder Group. Nairobi, Kenya. Retrieved February 19, 2025.
• "The Ole Ken Hotel". Nakuru, Kenya. 2022. Retrieved February 19, 2025.

• Lake Nakuru National Park website
• National Geographic – "Mysterious Kenya Flamingo Die-Offs Tied to Toxins, Study Says" (November 2002)