Selous Game Reserve
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How it came to be
The reserve began in 1896, when Hermann von Wissmann, governor of German East Africa, declared the area protected. It became a hunting reserve in 1905. In 1917 the big-game hunter and early conservationist Frederick Selous was killed at Beho Beho while fighting German forces in the First World War, and the reserve was named after him.
Covering about 50,000 km², it is among the largest protected areas in Africa. In 1976 it held about 109,000 elephants, then the largest population in the world. It was inscribed in 1982.
Between 2009 and 2013 poaching cut the elephant population by 66 percent, to about 13,000. The reserve was placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger in 2014, and in July 2019 construction began on the Stiegler's Gorge hydroelectric station on the Rufiji River. Part of the reserve has since been renamed Nyerere National Park.
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