. The Conservation Atlas of Tropical Forests: Africa. History of Forests and Climate tropical Africa for studies of environmental evolution. A more detailed account of the environmental history of the Rukiga Highlands is contained in Taylor (1988), which is fully acknowl- edged as a source of much of the information given here. One of the mires, Muchoya Swamp (2260 m altitude), is today surrounded by mountain bamboo Anindmaria alpma of probable anthropogenic origin and the other, Ahakagyezi Swamp (1830 m), by cultivated hillsides. Before the arrival of agriculture, the vege- tation around both
. The Conservation Atlas of Tropical Forests: Africa. History of Forests and Climate tropical Africa for studies of environmental evolution. A more detailed account of the environmental history of the Rukiga Highlands is contained in Taylor (1988), which is fully acknowl- edged as a source of much of the information given here. One of the mires, Muchoya Swamp (2260 m altitude), is today surrounded by mountain bamboo Anindmaria alpma of probable anthropogenic origin and the other, Ahakagyezi Swamp (1830 m), by cultivated hillsides. Before the arrival of agriculture, the vege- tation around both sites was moist montane forest, a remnant of which still survives at Bwindi (see case study on the Impenetrable Forest, chapter 31) about 10 km distant from each of the two sites (Figure ). Bwindi is the richest forest in East Africa in terms of numbers of species of mammals, birds and possibly trees and con- tains, among other rare species, a population of mountain gorilla Gorilla gonlla berengei. Both pollen diagrams show a major division at about 11,000 BP, with higher altitude types of vegetation being present on the hills around the swamp before this date (back to about 40,000 BP) and lower altitude vegetation thereafter. Evidence for this includes the abundance at one or both of the sites of such pollen types as Anthospemium comp. ( the pollen is similar to (compares with) pollen from the genus Anlhospennum), Artemisia, Cliffonia, Ericaceae, Hagenia and Stoebe (all from characteristically higher altitude plants) before about 11,000 BP and of such pollen types as Alchoniea, Cyarhea Ilex and Macaranga capensis later (all from characteristically lower altitude forest plants). This signifi- cant finding confirms that temperature depression was a feature of central Africa during much of the last ice age, as it was in many other parts of the world. Summarising the evidence for temperature reduction in tropi- cal Africa at the height of the last ice age (18,000 BP
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