Karoo National Park

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Karoo National Park
IUCN Category II (National Park)
Map of South Africa
Location:	Western Cape Province, South Africa
Nearest city:	Beaufort West^[1]
Coordinates:	32°21′0″S, 22°34′60″E
Area:	767.86 km²^[2]
Established:	1979
Governing body:	National Park Service

This article is about Karoo National Park. For the park in Tankwa, see Tankwa Karoo National Park.

The Karoo National Park, founded in 1979, is a wildlife reserve in the isolated Karoo area of the Western Cape, South Africa near Beaufort West. The area is mostly semi-desert and is well known for its isolation. The national park is home of many desert mammals, along with the Black Eagle and various species of tortoise, for the park lays claim to having the most of these species of any national park^[3]. Endangered species such as the Black Rhinoceros and Riverine Rabbit have been successfully resettled here. ^[4]

Many fossils have been uncovered at both the national park and its surrounding area, of which some are estimated at almost three-hundred million years old^[5]. Most fossils date from the Mesozoic Era to the Middle Ages in the history of the Earth. During this period, the area was covered by sea, depositing its sediment atop the dead creatures. The area then became volcanic and as the sandstone eroded away, it left the conical and table-shaped mountains that are characteristic of Karoo.

Karoo National Park is also known for its connection with the Quagga Project, a project run by Reinhold Rau to bring back an animal that looked and acted as much like the extinct quagga as possible. In 1998, fourteen quagga-like zebras were released into the park and, in January 2005, the most quagga-like foal was born, with narrower and fainter stripes in a more limited area of its body. This led Rau to predict that a full quagga would emerge by the fourth generation of breeding^[6].