Nyungwe Forest National Park is a national park

National park

A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individual nations designate their own national parks differently A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or...

 in southwestern Rwanda

Rwanda

Rwanda or , officially the Republic of Rwanda , is a country in central and eastern Africa with a population of approximately 11.4 million . Rwanda is located a few degrees south of the Equator, and is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of the Congo...

, located south of Lake Kivu

Lake Kivu

Lake Kivu is one of the African Great Lakes. It lies on the border between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Rwanda, and is in the Albertine Rift, a part of the Great Rift Valley. Lake Kivu empties into the Ruzizi River, which flows southwards into Lake Tanganyika...

 on the border with Burundi

Burundi

Burundi , officially the Republic of Burundi , is a landlocked country in the Great Lakes region of Eastern Africa bordered by Rwanda to the north, Tanzania to the east and south, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo to the west. Its capital is Bujumbura...

. The park was established in 2004 and covers an area of approximately 970 km² of rainforest

Rainforest

Rainforests are forests characterized by high rainfall, with definitions based on a minimum normal annual rainfall of 1750-2000 mm...

, bamboo

Bamboo

Bamboo is a group of perennial evergreens in the true grass family Poaceae, subfamily Bambusoideae, tribe Bambuseae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family....

, grassland

Grassland

Grasslands are areas where the vegetation is dominated by grasses and other herbaceous plants . However, sedge and rush families can also be found. Grasslands occur naturally on all continents except Antarctica...

, swamp

Swamp

A swamp is a wetland with some flooding of large areas of land by shallow bodies of water. A swamp generally has a large number of hammocks, or dry-land protrusions, covered by aquatic vegetation, or vegetation that tolerates periodical inundation. The two main types of swamp are "true" or swamp...

s, and bog

Bog

A bog, quagmire or mire is a wetland that accumulates acidic peat, a deposit of dead plant material—often mosses or, in Arctic climates, lichens....

s. The nearest town is Cyangugu, 54 km to the west. Mount Bigugu is located within the park borders.

Animal life

Nyungwe has a wide diversity of animal species, making it a priority for conservation in Africa. The forest is situated in a region where several large-scale biogeographical zones meet and the variety of terrestrial biome

Biome

Biomes are climatically and geographically defined as similar climatic conditions on the Earth, such as communities of plants, animals, and soil organisms, and are often referred to as ecosystems. Some parts of the earth have more or less the same kind of abiotic and biotic factors spread over a...

s provide a great span of microhabitats for many different species of plants and animals.

The park contains 13 different primate species (25% of Africa's total), 275 bird species, 1068 plant species, 85 mammal species, 32 amphibian and 38 reptile species. Many of these animals are restricted-range species that are only found in the Albertine Rift ecoregion in Africa. In fact, the number of endemic species found here is greater than in any other forest in the Albertine Rift that has been surveyed.

Primate species

• Common Chimpanzee
  Common Chimpanzee
  The common chimpanzee , also known as the robust chimpanzee, is a great ape. Colloquially, the common chimpanzee is often called the chimpanzee , though technically this term refers to both species in the genus Pan: the common chimpanzee and the closely related bonobo, formerly called the pygmy...
  
   (Pan troglodytes)
• Adolf Friedrich's Angola Colobus (Colobus angolensis ruwenzori)
• L'Hoest's Monkey
  L'Hoest's Monkey
  L'Hoest's monkey , or mountain monkey, is a guenon found in the upper eastern Congo basin. They mostly live in mountainous forest areas in small, female-dominated groups...
  
   (Cercopithecus l'hoesti)
• Silver Monkey
  Silver Monkey
  The silver monkey is a species of Old World monkey found primarily in East Africa. Its range includes Burundi, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The silver monkey was previously considered a subspecies of the blue monkey .- External links :* Flickr -...
  
   (Cercopithecus doggetti)
• Golden Monkey
  Golden Monkey
  The golden monkey is a species of Old World monkey found in the Virunga volcanic mountains of Central Africa, including four national parks: Mgahinga, in south-west Uganda; Volcanoes, in north-west Rwanda; and Virunga and Kahuzi-Biéga, in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo...
  
   (Cercopithecus kandti)
• Hamlyn's Monkey
  Hamlyn's Monkey
  Hamlyn's monkey , also known as the owl-faced monkey, is a species of Old World monkey that inhabits the bamboo and primary rainforests of the Congo. This species is exceedingly rare and known only from a few specimens; little is known about it...
  
   (Cercopithecus hamlyni)
• Red-tailed Monkey
  Red-tailed Monkey
  The red-tailed monkey, black-cheeked white-nosed monkey, red-tailed guenon, redtail monkey, or Schmidt's guenon is a species of primate in the Cercopithecidae family. It is found in Angola, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania,...
  
   (Cercopithecus ascanius)
• Dent's Mona Monkey
  Dent's Mona Monkey
  Dent's mona monkey is an Old World monkey in the Cercopithecidae family. It is found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Congo, Rwanda, western Uganda, and the Central African Republic. It was previously classified as a subspecies of Wolf's mona monkey C. wolf....
  
   (Cercopithecus denti)
• Vervet Monkey
  Vervet Monkey
  The vervet monkey , or simply vervet, is an Old World monkey of the family Cercopithecidae native to Africa. The term "vervet" is also used to refer to all the members of the genus Chlorocebus....
  
   (Chlorocebus pygerythrus)
• Olive Baboon
  Olive Baboon
  The olive baboon , also called the Anubis baboon, is a member of the family Cercopithecidae . The species is the most widely spread of all baboons: it is found in 25 countries throughout Africa, extending south from Mali to Ethiopia and to Tanzania. Isolated populations are also found in some...
  
   (Papio anubis)
• Grey-cheeked Mangabey
  Grey-cheeked Mangabey
  The grey-cheeked mangabey is an Old World monkey found in the forests of Central Africa. It ranges from Cameroon down to Gabon. The grey-cheeked mangabey is a dark monkey, looking in shape overall like a small, hairy baboon. Its thick brown fur is almost black in its forest home, with a slightly...
  
  (Lophocebus albigena)