Mkhambathi Nature Reserve

Mkhambathi Nature Reserve is a protected area at Lusikisiki in the Eastern Cape, South Africa. It is, with the Pondoland Marine Protected Area off its coastal edge. The reserve is located in the Pondoland Centre of Plant Endemism and the greater Maputaland–Pondoland–Albany Hotspot, and is covered in open grassland, dotted with patches of indigenous forest, swamp forests and flanked by the forested ravines of the Msikaba and Mtentu rivers. The Reserve was listed as a protected Ramsar site in 2025.

Biodiversity

Amphibians occur in the coastal region of the reserve.

The reserve has a large colony of Cape vulture.

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There is an abundance of endemic plants found in the Pondoland landscape of the reserve, including the endemic false water-berry, Rhynchocalyx lawsonioides. The Pondo palm is only found in this region, growing along the banks of the Msikaba and Mtentu rivers. Gurney's sugarbird can be found in protea bushes. Broad-tailed warblers can be found in marshland.

The endemic plants in the reserve face threats from fire as a consequence of poaching game, and of pervading invasive alien plants like: