Savute Channel: The river that doesn’t flow … flows again
February 2010
The Savute Channel also known as the Savuti River
Mysterious, forgotten, and now found again – The Savute Channel (or Savuti Channel), one of the greatest mysteries and fascinations of northern Botswana, is sparkling with light once more after nearly 30 years of lying dormant. Until recently, the channel was an open grassland, home to numerous animals such as large herds of zebra, impala and wildebeest, and abundant predators such as lion, cheetah and wild dog.
Historical records show that the Savute River, or the Savute Channel, has a habit of flowing and then drying for decades, wiping out wildlife along its banks in the process. Derek and Beverly Joubert captured the change to a dry river on film for National Geographic in “Journey to the Forgetten River“, which documents how tens of thousands of wildlife inhabitants of the Savute River perished. At the time, the river dried up mysteriously forcing the wildlife, including hippos to try to journey back to the Chobe/Linyanti river, with many of them perishing on the way.
The river, covering over 100km as it flows from the Linyanti River (fed from the Zibadianja Lagoon), through a gap in the Magwikhwe Sand Ridge, past Savute Elephant Camp. It is only a matter of days before it reaches its final destination, the Savute Marsh in the Mababe Depression, in the middle of the Chobe National Park.
Since November 2008, its painstakingly slow meander (falling only 18cm for every kilometer covered) has been keenly followed by many, and yet, surprisingly, the water seemed to arrive overnight at Elephant Camp.
The wildlife species are responding to the call in a big way, according to tour operators with camps along the Savuti River. Herds of wildlife are delighting in the fresh new water source, celebrating the abundance of the channel.
Alice Crowe, the assistant operations manager at Orient Express Safaris, which runs a camping facility along the Savuti Channel commented that the Savute River came to life on January 4 this year when they woke up to sights of floods. “Now we see our camp is overlooking the river, which is a really nice view. It is exciting to have water flowing in after so many years…there is a lot more game coming down to the river now, in fact they are coming down right in front of our camp”.
The area is all ready seeing the return of wildlife species such the fish eagle, pied king fishers, the egrets, wadding birds like the swan, while the number of the common species has vastly increased. It is now a matter of time before hippos, crocodiles, let alone fish, also start re-appearing in the Savute River, which is now heading towards the marshes of the Mababe Depression where it empties its waters.
The Savute Channel has only ever flowed intermittently. It last flowed from 1967 to 1981, but since then the channel and the Savute Marsh have been dry, a phenomenon that has occurred on and off over centuries.
Gaunt skeletons of trees, now long dead, that grew in one of the earlier dry periods, line both the channel and the marsh. These trees would have had at least 50 years of dry conditions in which to grow and mature into the size they reached, before drowning during a subsequent flood. Records show that the channel and the marsh dried out during the 1880s.
Lions on Savuti - copyright James Weis
How the Savute gets its water has remained mystery even to scientists. For instance, there has been countless times when the Savuti River was flooding but its water would never flow into the so-called channel measuring over 100km before it ends into the marshes of the Mababe Depression.
What is clear today, however, is that after 30 years of lying dead deep in the Kalahari Desert, the once vibrant Savute River, which feeds from the Chobe/ Linyanti River is alive and calling again to multiples of wildlife species to perch, play, and make its waters and environs their homes again.
It remained dry until the summer of 1957-58 when heavy rains in the catchment area of the Angolan highlands re-flooded the Chobe river system, and the channel flowed once again until 1966.
Records show that the Savute Channel and the marsh dried up during the 1880s. Explorer and missionary Dr David Livingstone commented, on his way to discovering the ‘Mosi O’Tunya’ (Victoria Falls) in 1851 that it was a “dismal swamp”. Its’ irregular flowing pattern continued until 1981, when the channel seemed to dry up completely and be lost forever.
The Channel remained dry until the summer of 1957-58 when heavy rains in the catchment area of the Angolan highlands re-flooded the Chobe River system and the Channel flowed once again until 1966. Its irregular flowing pattern continued until 1981, when the channel seemed to dry up completely and be lost forever.
As northern Botswana experienced very strong seismic activity in April 2008, as well as a super flood season, it is once again hard to distinguish whether both or just one of the factors are causing the channel to flow again, or whether it is pure coincidence. … and so the mystery of the dead river continues.
For more information, there is an interesting blog at Africa Travel Journal by James Weis that complements this story.
[...] few posts back, we noted the Suvute Channel is a river after 20 years. That article created a bit of a buzz on several forums. For infrequent safari travelers, [...]
Do you have any new info on the water flow in the Savuti channel? The progress of the water into the marsh? I will be in Savuti in July. I do enjoy your website imensely, I am a regular visitor to Botswana-mostly Mghoto, Moremi and 3 times Chobe.
Ben
An update on the River. I found a great link documenting the situation as of June 2010. You can read the excellently documented summary at the Safari Photographer’s blog. here is the link: http://www.thesafariphotographer.com/safari-days/610