The natural features of Tshwane range from 2 000 million-year-old granite rocks to the 220 000-year-old meteorite crater - Tswaing Crater - and from grassy highveld plains to the shrub lands of the African savannah. Few cities in South Africa have as much uncluttered and preserved land as Tshwane.

Natural heritage gems of Tshwane

The Rietvlei Nature Reserve covers an area of 3 800ha and has the capacity to support 2 000 head of game. Some of the wildlife that can be seen includes buffalo, white rhino, hippo, eland, zebra, springbuck, blesbuck, waterbuck and cheetah. More than 240 bird species, unique to this area, can be seen.

The 12ha Austin Roberts Memorial Bird Sanctuary was proclaimed a nature reserve in 1958 and is declared a national monument. The Sasol Hadeda Bird hide gives bird lovers the opportunity to experience a great variety of birds, including the crowned crane and blue crane.

This is the first proclaimed game sanctuary on the African continent. On 25 February 1895, President Paul Kruger proclaimed the valley on the southern outskirts of Pretoria as a game sanctuary. The Groenkloof Nature Reserve offers various activities for nature lovers, such as hiking trails, a mountain-bike trail, a motorcar route and a 4x4 route. The wildlife that can be seen includes zebra, jackal, duiker, kudu, impala, blue wildebeest, blesbuck, red hartebeest, ostrich, giraffe and sable.

Situated in the northern part of the city, and straddling the Magaliesberg range, is the Wonderboom Nature Reserve, a 100ha reserve famous for its magnificent specimen of the Wonderboom (wonder tree), a wild fig that grows at the foot of the northern slope of the Wonderboom Hill. The tree is some 1 000 years old, and over the years the branches have grown longer, hanging lower and lower until they touched the ground, rooted and produced a circle of daughter trees. Today three circles of daughter trees surround the original tree.

Some 220 000 years ago a blazing stony meteorite the size of half a football field slammed into the earth's crust. The impact formed a huge crater, 1,4 km in diameter and 200 m deep. This crater, formerly known as the Pretoria Saltpan (or Zoutpan), is situated 40 km north to the northwest of The City of Tshwane. It is one of the best-preserved meteorite impact craters anywhere in the world.