Lake Nakuru
- UNESCO World Heritage
- UNESCO natural beauty
Interesting facts
- About 10,000 years ago Nakuru, Elementaita and Bogoria formed a single deep freshwater lake, which later dried into three separate alkaline remnants.
- Scientists have estimated that Nakuru's flamingos once ate about 250,000 kg of algae per hectare of lake surface each year.
- A small tilapia, Alcolapia grahami, was introduced in the early 1960s and flourishes in water too alkaline for most fish, feeding pelicans and cormorants.
- The lake has almost dried up several times in the past half-century, and its area has swung from around 5 to 68 square kilometres.
- In 2009 the fenced sanctuary held more than 25 eastern black rhinos, one of Kenya's largest concentrations, plus about 70 southern white rhinos.
- Rothschild's giraffes were relocated here from western Kenya from 1977 onwards to keep the endangered subspecies safe.
- More than 400 bird species have been recorded on the lake and in the surrounding park, from African fish eagles to Goliath herons.
- Lake Nakuru National Park was created in 1961 and now covers about 188 square kilometres.
- The lake was designated a Ramsar wetland of international importance on 5 June 1990.
Why it is worth it
For most of the twentieth century, Lake Nakuru was described by ornithologists in almost hyperbolic terms — one famous account called the sight of its flamingo flocks "the greatest bird spectacle on Earth," with counts at times estimated well over a million birds packed onto a single shallow lake. That reputation was built on genuine chemistry: Nakuru is a soda lake, alkaline enough that it grows dense blooms of blue-green algae, and lesser flamingos filter that algae out of the water in numbers few other places on the planet can match.
That chemistry has changed, and it's worth knowing before setting expectations for a visit. Since around 2013, and especially from 2020 onward, Lake Nakuru's water level has risen dramatically — its surface area roughly doubled over a decade — diluting the alkaline water that the algae need to bloom. Less algae means less food, and in recent years the famous flocks have largely relocated to other Rift Valley soda lakes, particularly Lake Bogoria and Lake Natron across the border in Tanzania, leaving Nakuru with only a fraction of the flamingo numbers that made it famous. Scientists studying the shift point to broader climate-driven rainfall changes across the Rift Valley lake system rather than anything specific to Nakuru itself.
What hasn't left is the reason the lake became one of Kenya's first dedicated rhino sanctuaries: a fenced, closely-monitored population of both black and white rhino that has become one of the more reliable rhino-viewing sites in East Africa, alongside troops of endangered Rothschild's giraffe that were introduced to the park specifically because it offered that kind of protected space. The lake is also part of the Kenya Lake System UNESCO World Heritage Site, recognised jointly with Lakes Bogoria and Elementaita for the alkaline lake ecosystem the three sites share.
Good to know
Flamingo numbers at Nakuru have declined sharply since the lake's water level rose in the 2010s and 2020s; visitors specifically chasing large flamingo flocks may have better luck at nearby Lake Bogoria, though Nakuru remains one of East Africa's most reliable spots for rhino and giraffe sightings.
Getting there
7 km from Nakuru. Nanyuki Civil Airport (NYK) is about 112 km away.
On these lists
From the encyclopaedia
Lake Nakuru is one of the Rift Valley lakes, located at an elevation of 1,754 m (5,755 ft) above sea level. It lies to the south of Nakuru, in the rift valley of Kenya and is protected by Lake Nakuru National Park.
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