The Great Karoo (or Karoo tout court) is a predominantly level semi-arid region with a scanty vegetation cover and a number of precipitous hills up to 2,000m/6,560ft in height. With an area of around 500,000sq.km/193,000sq.mi, it occupies a third of the total area of South Africa. The Karoo begins in the south (just north of the Garden Route) as the Little Karoo, which then becomes the Great Karoo, followed, far to the north, by the Upper Karoo, which again, on the border with Namibia and Botswana, is continued by the Kalahari.
The first inhabitants were nomadic Bushmen, who found in the Karoo ample grazing for their flocks and herds as well as for wild animals.
They also gave the region its name, from a term in their language meaning the "great drought". The wealth of game formerly to be found here attracted European sportsmen and later farmers, both of whom left an enduring mark on the ecological equilibrium of the Karoo. First the predators were exterminated, and then large areas of the Karoo were enclosed. The herds of livestock over-grazed the grassland and the fences restricted the free movement of the surviving wild animals. The flora and fauna of the Karoo were irreparably changed. In more recent years, however, when the economic value of a healthy natural environment is recognized, nature reserves have been established in which the landscape can be preserved for its inhabitants.
The climate is unpredictable, with wide daily and seasonal variations in temperature, ranging between over 40°C/104°F and 27°C/119°F. Most of what little rain there is falls in February and March, and then the vegetation is transformed. Normally the Karoo has a cover of low woody scrub, interspersed with succulents, aloes, mesembryanthemum, stonecrop, euphorbias and Stapelia, which can store water in their thick leaves and their roots. After a brief shower of rain the grasses recover first and the Karoo becomes green; several days of rain, and the Karoo becomes a paradise of bloom. The seeds of these "one-day flowers of the desert", which can sometimes remain inactive for years, then suddenly germinate, producing a marvelous carpet of blossom.
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Great Karoo, Beaufort West
