The Makgadikgadi Pan in Botswana is Africa’s largest salt-pan basin and a breeding ground for flamingos.
The name describes a vast complex rather than one perfectly continuous sheet of salt. Its main pans include Sua, Ntwetwe and Nxai, spread across the Kalahari Basin. Together they are remnants of ancient Lake Makgadikgadi, a much larger water body that gradually disappeared tens of thousands of years ago.
For much of the dry season, the surface is a dazzling crust of salt and clay. Seasonal rains transform parts of the basin into shallow wetlands, attracting zebra, wildebeest, pelicans and migratory waterbirds. The Sua Pan, one section of the wider complex, is especially important for greater flamingos and contains one of only two major breeding populations of the species in southern Africa.
A common mix-up is Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia, which is often described as the world’s largest individual salt flat. Makgadikgadi is better understood as a huge African salt-pan system whose wildlife value changes dramatically between dry and wet seasons.