Fever Tree Silhouette, Nsumo Pan

The fever trees are an amazing sight in Mkuze, growing on the edges of rivers and wetlands: here in silhouette at the pan, but the tawny eagle in previous photo also is nesting in one. Their most striking feature is that distinctive lime bark which feels soft, almost flaky.

The fever trees (Acacia xanthophloea) are so named as early settlers sleeping under the trees contracted malaria and suffered the characteristic spiking fevers. However, the link is not the trees themselves of course but the mosquito vectors of malaria, which also live around the rivers and wetlands.