Landscapes and Landforms of Botswana

This volume contains 22 chapters introducing a wide range of semi-arid and geologic landscapes. Botswana, a thinly populated nation, the size of France, is a Southern African keystone country at the heart of the Kalahari, sharing some of the major sub-continental drainage basins such as the Limpopo, Zambezi, Orange, and Okavango with its neighbouring countries. The extensive Kalahari Sand surface has been sculptured by numerous past processes which have produced subtle but regional landforms consisting of extensive dunes and shorelines. Incipient rifting has created the dynamic Okavango and Makgadikgadi fan-basin systems which produces iconic wetlands with a world heritage status. Geological outcrops in particular to the east expose highly denuded basement lithologies which produces numerous inselbergs that are home to a rich archaeological heritage. The book also examines the geomorphology of mineral and water resources which sustain the economy and population and also features dedicated chapters that cover diamondiferous kimberlites, caves, pans, dams, duricrusts and wildlife.

Chapter 6 is available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

Auteur

Frank Eckardt is a geomorphologist who has been working at the University of Cape Town (UCT) since 2005. Originally from Germany, raised in various European countries and educated in the UK, Eckardt obtained a BSc in Geography at Kings College London, an MSc in applied remote sensing from Silsoe (Cranfield) and a DPhil from the School of Geography in Oxford.

After working as an undergraduate on glacial forelands in Norway and coastal marine habitats in Belize during his masters, he shifted to southern African drylands while conducting his PhD fieldwork in Namibia. Prior to coming to UCT, Frank Eckardt was teaching physical geography and remote sensing at the University of Botswana and acted as a remote sensing consulted on variety of projects. He currently teaches global physical geography to first years and focuses on earth observation as well as contemporary polar, tropical and arid land surface dynamics in the second year. In their final year, students are exposed to Southern Africa's Geomorphology, which among other things includes topics such as landscape evolution, weathering, soils, duricrusts, as well as contemporary mineral dust production. Frank Eckardt is currently president of the International Society for Aeolian Research (ISAR) and Head of Department at the Environmental and Geographical Sciences at UCT.

Contenu

Foreword - Otlogetswe Totolo Dedication to Marty McFarlane Preface by Series Editor - Piotr Migon Preface by Editor - Frank Eckardt Author Biographies Table of Contents Chapter 1 - Introduction to the Landscape and Landforms of BotswanaJulius Atlhopheng and Read B. M. Mapeo Chapter 2 - The Angolan catchments of northern Botswana's major rivers: the Cubango, Cuito, Cuando and Zambezi riversJohn Mendelsohn Chapter 3 - The Okavango Delta PeatlandsWilliam Ellery and Karen Ellery Chapter 4 - Landscape evolution of the Lake Ngami and Mababe Depressions within the Okavango Rift Zone, north-central BotswanaSusan Ringrose Chapter 5 - The Makgadikgadi BasinSallie L. Burrough Chapter 6 - Landscapes and landforms of the Chobe Enclave, Northern BotswanaThuto Mokatse, Nathalie Diaz, Elisha Shemang, John Van Thuyne, Pascal Vittoz, Torsten Vennemann and Eric P. Verrecchia Chapter 7 - The Chobe-Zambezi channel-floodplain system: anatomy of a wetland in a drylandS. Tooth, M. Vandewalle, Douglas Goodin, Kathleen A. Alexander Chapter 8 - Dunes of the southern KalahariDavid S.G. Thomas and Giles F.S. Wiggs Chapter 9 - Dunes of the northern KalahariDavid S.G. Thomas Chapter 10 - Kalahari Pans: Quaternary Evolution and Processes of Ephemeral Lakes Irka Schüller, Lukas Belz, Heinz Wilkes and Achim Wehrmann Chapter 11 - Dry valleys (mekgacha)David J. Nash Chapter 12 - Landscape evolution of the Stampriet Transboundary Basin and relation to the groundwater systemAbi Stone Chapter 13 - Calcretes, silcretes and intergrade duricrustsDavid J. Nash Chapter 14 - Geodiversity of Caves and Rockshelters in BotswanaMark Stephens, Mike de Wit and Maipelo S. Isaacs Chapter 15 - Kimberlites, kimberlite exploration, and the geomorphic evolution of Botswana Andy Moore and Mike Roberts Chapter 16 - Geomorphology and landscapes of the Limpopo River systemJasper Knight Chapter 17 - Dams in Botswana: Drying times aheadJeremy S. Perkins and Bhagabat P. Parida Chapter 18 - Gorges of eastern BotswanaMark Stephens Chapter 19 - Soil Development in the Eastern HardveldPeter N. Eze Chapter 20 - The Tsodilo Hills: a multifaceted World Heritage SiteMarek Wendorff Chapter 21 - Geoconservation in BotswanaMaipelo S. Isaacs and Mark Stephens Chapter 22 - Zoogeomorphology of BotswanaJeremy S. Perkins Obituary Marty McFarlane