Lake Mai-Ndombe

Location

The lake drains to the south through the Fimi River into the Kwah and Congo Rivers. Known until 1972 as Lake Leopold II (French: Lac Léopold II; Dutch: Leopold II-meer) after Leopold II, King of the Belgians. Mai-Ndombe means "black water" in Kikongo. The lake is of irregular shape and ranges in depth from only 5 meters (mean) to 10 meters (maximum). Covering approximately 890 square miles (2,300 square km), it is known to double or triple in size during the rainy season. Its waters are oxygenated throughout their depth and the pH ranges from 4.2 to 5.5. Low, forested shores surround it with dense, humid equatorial rainforest prevailing to the north and a mosaic of forest and savanna to the south.

Biodiversity

Surveys have revealed a high biodiversity in and around the lake, with animals such as two species of otters, marsh mongoose, giant otter shrew, numerous waterbirds, crocodiles and turtles.

Mai-Ndombe contains acidic, humic-rich blackwater and in general the fish of this lake have been poorly documented, even compared to other regions in the Congo River basin. In 2006, another new species of cichlid, Nanochromis wickleri, was described, and in 2008, a new catfish species, Chrysichthys praecox, was documented.

Economic activity

Some of the main concession areas of the logging company Sodefor are to the north and south of Lake Mai-Ndombe.{{cite web |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160304030926/http://www.sodefor.net/garantiesdf-social.php |archive-date = 2016-03-04 |url-status = dead

Lake Mai-Ndombe and the river system is often used for transportation across the country because the land based road system is inadequate. Many passenger ferries carry hundreds of people each day. Many of these boats are old and not maintained. On Saturday, May 25, 2019, a passenger ferry with over 350 passengers sank in high winds. Over 45 passengers were confirmed dead in the first day and over hundred deemed still missing. In response the government said it would ban wooden passenger boats over 5 years old from traversing the lake.

Bibliography

• Mapping the vegetation cover of the Mai-Ndombe region (Democratic Republic of the Congo). Regional School of Integrated Forest and Land Management. University of Kinshasa, July 2003
• Source book for the inland fishery resources of Africa, Vol. 1. J.-P. Vanden Bossche & G.M. Bernacsek

References

References

1. Peck, E. (2013, updated 2015). [http://www.feow.org/ecoregions/details/mai_ndombe Mai Ndombe] {{Webarchive. link. (2017-01-16 . Freshwater Ecoregions of the World. Retrieved 11 October 2019.)
2. Donald J. Stewart. (February 23, 1984). "A New Species of Dwarf Cichilid Fish with Reversed Sexual Dichromatism from Lac Mai-Ndombe, Zaïre". Copeia.
3. Ulrich K. Schliewen. (April 10, 2006). "A new species of ''Nanochromis'' (Teleostei: Cichlidae) from Lake Mai Ndombe, central Congo Basin, Democratic Republic of Congo". Zootaxa.
4. Michael Hardman. "A sexually dimorphic species of ''Chrysichthys'' (Siluriformes: Claroteidae) from Lac Mai-Ndombe, Democratic Republic of the Congo". Ichthyol. Explor. Freshwaters.
5. [https://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8384441.stm BBC News article reporting the boat sinking]
6. (2019-05-27). "30 dead, more than 150 missing after boat sinks on Congo lake".