Botswana packs an astonishing amount of life into its wild places, and the reason is water. The Okavango pours a flood into the middle of a desert every year, and everything that walks, swims or flies arranges itself around it. Here is an honest introduction to what you can hope to see, and where.
Botswana is elephant country like nowhere else on earth, home to the largest population of any nation, around 130,000 of them. In the dry months they gather along the Chobe riverfront in herds that can stretch as far as you can see, swimming trunk-to-tail between islands. In the Delta and Linyanti you meet them more intimately, wading past your mokoro or drifting silently through camp at night.
Lions are widespread and thrillingly visible, from the famous prides of Savuti to the swamp lions of the northern Delta that have learned to hunt in water. Leopards thrive in the riverine forests of Moremi and Khwai, and this is one of the best places in Africa to actually watch one, rather than glimpse a tail disappearing. Cheetahs favour the drier, open country of the Kalahari and the pans.
If you have dreamed of African wild dogs, you have chosen the right country. Northern Botswana, especially Moremi, Khwai and the Linyanti, is one of their last great strongholds. From roughly June to August the packs den, staying in one area to raise their pups, which is the most reliable window for spending real time with them.
The Delta has its own cast entirely. Hippos rule the channels and lagoons, crocodiles patrol beneath, and the floodplains belong to red lechwe, thousands of them, exploding through the shallows in sheets of spray. The shy, semi-aquatic sitatunga is the connoisseur's antelope, best looked for from a quiet mokoro.
We will be straight with you: rhino numbers in Botswana are small and the animals are intensively protected, so a sighting is a rare privilege rather than something to plan a trip around. If rhino are top of your list, tell us, and we will give you honest advice, which may include combining Botswana with a destination where sightings are more likely.
Away from the water, a different Botswana appears. The Makgadikgadi and Nxai Pans host one of Africa's longest zebra migrations, tens of thousands of animals chasing the rains. The Kalahari adds gemsbok, springbok, black-maned lions, the elusive brown hyena, and the ever-delightful meerkats, some habituated groups near the pans will happily use you as a lookout post.
Close to 600 species have been recorded, and even sworn non-birders come home converted. The prize is Pel's fishing owl, a giant ginger ghost of the Delta's forests. September to November brings carmine bee-eaters in their impossible pink thousands, and the floodplains hold significant numbers of the stately wattled crane. The green season, December to March, is the birding peak, when the migrants arrive in breeding colour.
None of this is an accident. Botswana chose low-volume, higher-cost tourism decades ago, which keeps visitor numbers small and funds enormous private concessions where wildlife, not vehicles, sets the agenda. Tourism revenue supports anti-poaching work and community trusts, so the animals are worth more alive than not, and local people share in that value. Challenges remain, rhino poaching among them, but the model is one of conservation's genuine success stories, and travelling here is part of what keeps it working. It is a big part of why we love Botswana.
Four of them, very possibly: elephant, lion, leopard and buffalo are all regularly seen on a well-planned northern circuit. Rhino sightings are rare, as numbers are small and heavily protected, so we would never promise one. What Botswana offers instead is quality: unhurried sightings with hardly another vehicle in sight.
The dry season, roughly May to October, concentrates animals around permanent water and is the classic game-viewing window. The green season has its own magic: newborn antelope, migrant birds and dramatic skies. Our when to go guide walks through it month by month.
No honest safari company will guarantee wildlife, and we won't either. What stacks the odds in your favour is where you go and who guides you: private concessions, small camps and Botswana's superbly trained guides. That is exactly what we plan for.
Outstanding, with close to 600 recorded species. December to March is the peak, when migrants arrive and residents are in breeding plumage, and specialist birding guides are available if you would like one.
Wild dogs, big elephant herds or a Pel's fishing owl. Tell us what you long to see and we will plan around it.
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