Range Description

The Black Wildebeest occurs in South Africa, Swaziland, and Lesotho. By the end of the 19th century, excessive hunting had reduced the formerly vast population to a few individuals surviving on two farms in the Free State Province of South Africa; since then, protection by farmers and conservation agencies has allowed the species to recover (East 1999, Vrahimis in press). It has now been reintroduced to parts of its former range (western Swaziland and western Lesotho) and into farmland areas outside of its natural range (Namibia). A detailed discussion of the historical distribution of the species is given by Von Richter (1971).