New protected environment on the Kromme River
The Kromme-Geelhout Protected Environment is a new Protected Area that was recently declared near St Francis Bay.
The Greater Kromme Stewardship (GKS) initiative is a partnership between the WWF Table Mountain Fund, the Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency and a number of private landowners.
The Kromme-Geelhout Protected Environment lies on the peninsula where the Kromme River and the Geelhoutboom River meet.
The Kromme-Geelhout Protected Environment contains a diverse range of habitat types ranging from riparian habitats and estuarine salt marshes to thicket habitats and unique fynbos types like the Humansdorp Shale Renosterveld (which is nationally listed as endangered).
As a result, the Kromme-Geelhout Protected Environment sustains an extraordinary diversity of threatened and endemic species, many of which are unique to the Kouga region.
Extremely rare and critically endangered species have also been recorded on the Kromme-Geelhout Protected Environment, like the Salt Marsh Gecko (Cryptactites peringueyi) and Brunsvigia litoralis.