For Ian--It's Controversial, Costly, and The Horn's Grow Back Making It Costly, Over and Over Again.

18-Nov-09 8:00 AM CST
International Rhino Foundation

Rhinos De-Horned to Stop Poaching

Three black rhinos at Imire Safari Park have been dehorned in order to prevent them from being killed by poachers. Imire has four black and two white rhino, and all but one baby have now been dehorned. An estimated 200 rhino have been killed by poachers in the last three years.

MARONDERA – In August 2007: Imire lost three of their rhinos. Even though they had been dehorned, they were brutally killed by poachers. It has been speculated that the poachers were not aware that the rhinos had been dehorned. However, they managed to cut off the male rhino’s stub of horn, so some believe that the massacre of these dehorned rhinos was a politically motivated act, and that the poachers were fully aware that these rhino did not have horns but went out and killed them anyway.

Another theory is that poachers have now resorted to killing off rhinos for the sake of being able to cover more ground when it comes to poaching. That way they can keep track of the rhinos that are still alive in certain areas and can then condense the margin they have to cover when poaching. Zimbabwe has become a hot spot for rhino poaching, and with the demand for rhino horns ever increasing from the Asian market, the question remains; how can these relentless poachers be stopped? Dehorning is one solution, as it stops giving poachers a reason to kill these animals. The Rhino are sedated, a qualified vet is brought in, and the horn is literally sawn off. They suffer no pain, and are back on their feet in a matter of minutes.

However the act of dehorning has been quite a controversial topic, with the main argument being that rhinos use their horns for grazing, and for protection in the wild. If the animals are dehorned it may affect their entire social behavior. Reily Travis, who has lived on Imire his entire life, and runs the volunteer programme on the farm, thinks that there is another way
that Zimbabwe can save the rhinos and their horns. He explained that it costs in the region of US$200,000 to capture and re-release rhinos into safer areas, and to dehorn them. He believes this money should rather be used on a tracking system. This involves a UV-based chip being implanted in the rhino’s horn – giving 24 hour surveillance.

“The process of dehorning has been going on for 10 years and unfortunately has not made a big enough impact. The rate of poaching still doubles each year,” explained Travis. Another point that Travis made, was that if these rhino did have chips in their horns, they could then also track where and how these horns were being smuggled out of the country. This would hopefully lead to exposing the culprits that are involved in these illegal dealings. He added that the money used for capturing and dehorning the rhino could also be channeled towards National Parks employees, who he thinks have lost motivation because they are not being given enough incentive and do not have enough equipment to protect these animals “It is so important to keep the people on the ground happy because they are, at the end of the day, putting their lives on the line to ensure the safety of these rhinos,” he said.

South African conservationist, Michael Eustace told the South African TV show, Carte Blanche, recently that the solution to the poaching problem was to flood the market. He estimated that the revenue could be up to US$90 million per annum. By flooding the market, the price of the Rhino horn comes down, which means that the act of poaching these rhinos becomes less attractive. National Parks have obtained an estimated 40kg of horns which could be used to flood the market. However Travis disagrees, saying that the market will only keep growing and eventually Zimbabwe will not be able to meet the demands of the consumers, and the poachers will return. He also argues that legalizing the sale of rhino horns would have to be a national effort in which all parties concerned would have to undertake the dehorning and legal sale of the horns. With the high level poaching syndicate that exists in Zimbabwe, it is unlikely that the selling of these horns would remain above board.

DEHORNING OF BLACK (Diceros bicornis ... - Rhino Resource Center

DEHORNING BLACK RHINO: THE NAMIBIAN EXPERIENCE

George Eastman

An excerpt from a 16mm motion picture shot by George Eastman, Kodak's founder, while on an African safari in 1926 with Martin and Osa Johnson.

Western Black Rhino Declared Extinct(Which is something RJR didn't want to hear.)

For some species on the edge, captivity is the only hope.

No wild black rhinos remain in West Africa, according to the latest global assessment of threatened species.

The Red List, drawn up by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), has declared the subspecies extinct.

A subspecies of white rhino in central Africa is also listed as possibly extinct, the organisation says.

The annual update of the Red List now records more threatened species than ever before.

The IUCN reports that despite conservation efforts, 25% of the world's mammals are at risk of extinction. As part of its latest work it has reassessed several rhinoceros groups.

Poaching vulnerability

As well as declaring the western black rhino (Diceros bicornis longipes) extinct, it records the northern white rhino (Ceratotherium simum cottoni), a subspecies in central Africa, as being on the brink of extinction.

The last Javan rhino (Rhinoceros sondaicus) outside Java is also believed to have disappeared.

Overall numbers of black and white rhinos have been rising, but some subspecies have been particularly vulnerable to poaching by criminal gangs who want to trade the animals' valuable horns.

Simon Stuart, chair of the IUCN Species Survival Commission, told BBC News: "They had the misfortune of occurring in places where we simply weren't able to get the necessary security in place.

"You've got to imagine an animal walking around with a gold horn; that's what you're looking at, that's the value and that's why you need incredibly high security."

Another focus for this year's list is Madagascar and its reptiles. The report found that 40% of terrestrial reptiles are threatened. But it also says that new areas have been designated for conservation.

That will help protect endangered species including Tarzan's chameleon (Calumma tarzan) and the limbless skink (Paracontias fasika).

Among the success stories identified in the latest annual update is the reintroduction of the Przewalski's horse (Equus ferus). Listed extinct in the wild in 1996, it was brought back after a captive breeding programme and the wild population is now thought to exceed 300.

Among the partner organisations involved in compiling the research for the list is the Zoological Society of London (ZSL).

ZSL's Dr Monika Boehm said: "This Red List update very much shows us a mixed picture of what's happening to the world's species. There's some good news and some bad news.

"Unfortunately, the overall trend is still a decline in biodiversity. We still haven't achieved our conservation potential."

Could legalising horn trade save rhinos?

Courtesy of Mark Rosenthal





Record for S Africa rhino killing


The seventh black rhino population established by the WWF Black Rhino Range Expansion Project, was recently released after an epic 1500 kilometre trip across the country. 19 of the critically endangered animals were moved from the Eastern Cape to a new location in Limpopo province.

"This was possible because of the far-sightedness of the Eastern Cape Provincial government who were prepared to become partners in the project for the sake of black rhino conservation in South Africa," said WWF's project leader Dr Jacques Flamand. "The operation was difficult due to the number of animals and the long distances involved. But wildlife veterinarians, conservation managers and capture teams from WWF, Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency, SANParks and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife worked cooperatively to ensure the success of the translocation. We all learned from one another and were united in a common cause."

"We are a young organisation and this is a great opportunity to be giving something back to the national conservation effort," said Dave Balfour, conservation director of the Eastern Cape Parks and Tourism Agency. "We are excited about getting ourselves integrated into national conservation. A critical element of future conservation success will be the ability of agencies with a common interest to work together. This was a great example of that."

A relatively new capture technique was used to airlift some of the rhinos out of difficult or inaccessible areas by helicopter. This entails suspending the sleeping rhino by the ankles for a short trip through the air to awaiting vehicles. "Previously rhinos were either transported by lorry over very difficult tracks, or airlifted in a net. This new procedure is gentler on the darted rhino because it shortens the time it has to be kept asleep with drugs, the respiration is not as compromised as it can be in a net and it avoids the need for travel in a crate over terrible tracks," explains Dr Flamand. "Another advantage is that rhinos can be more easily removed from dangerous situations, for example if they have fallen asleep in a donga or other difficult terrain after being darted. The helicopter translocations usually take less than ten minutes, and the animals suffer no ill effect. All of the veterinarians working on the translocation agreed that this was now the method of choice for the well-being of the animals."

Security of rhinos is a major concern given the current poaching onslaught. Project partners receiving rhinos on their land are only chosen if their security systems are of a high standard. "Translocating rhinos always involves risk, but we cannot keep all our eggs in one basket. It is essential to manage black rhino populations for maximum growth as it is still a critically endangered species and this is what the project does by creating large new populations which we hope will breed quickly," concludes Dr Flamand.

The WWF Black Rhino Range Expansion Project aims to increase the range and numbers of black rhino in South Africa and has created seven significant black rhino populations in eight years. Close to 120 black rhino have been translocated to date.

Courtesy of Jim Stockley

The Circus "NO SPIN ZONE": Eastern Cape Black Rhino Range Expansion Project


'It get's harder and harder each day to justify spending millions of dollars building feel good sanctuaries for elephants that will make no genetic contribution what so ever to an endangered population, and rescuing lions from Bolivia and spending millions to feed them and build them "biodome habitats," when we are losing valid animal species every daily. Yes, by all means correct what was wrong to bring them to their current state, not by banning, but by educating and regulating. Don't continue wasting millions to make their last years "happy and joyful." Happy and joyful!!! Get real world, wake up to reality. They are finished, done with, of no use what so ever. Learn from mistakes, capitalize on success's. Don't think for a moment you are doing animals of the world any favors with a non breeding sanctuary members cocktail party. You are pissing in the wind, in an effort to give yourself some type of emotional validity. Donate your millions to a zoo or game preserve where it will be of some good to the world, and not just good for you.

Motty--Chester Zoo 1978

Karl Shukar blog:

Whatever doubts had been entertained in the past that an intergeneric elephant hybrid was possible were emphatically swept away by this living, breathing refutation, because Motty’s entire morphology was a complex and thoroughly fascinating composite of maternal Elephas and paternal Loxodonta characteristics. To begin with, whereas the back of Elephas is arched and that of Loxodonta is concave, Motty’s back was both – possessing a central hump but also a pelvic one. His head exhibited a similar ambiguity, for although his brow was sloping with a single frontal dome like Loxodonta, he also sported the smaller paired posterior skull domes characteristic of Elephas. Even his trunk was an intergeneric compromise – heavily wrinkled like that of Loxodonta, but with only a single digit at its tip like Elephas (Loxodonta has two trunk digits). Adding to his Elephas features were his feet, as they bore five toenails on each front foot and four on each hind foot (more than in savannah Loxodonta elephants), but his Loxodonta heritage reasserted itself in his longer slimmer legs and his larger pointed ears.



At 9 am on Day 11 (21 July), the keepers arrived to start work at the elephant house as usual – only to discover to their horror that Motty was comatose and dying. Immediately, the zoo’s vets began emergency heart massage and artificial respiration, and also injected a cardiac stimulant as well as providing him with extra warmth, but all to no avail. Less than an hour later, little Motty the miracle elephant was dead. A full autopsy discovered that he had been suffering from an unsuspected outbreak of necrotic enterocolitis – parts of the large intestine’s wall possessed dead tissue, becoming almost perforated – plus E. coli septicaemia. It seems likely that Motty’s weakened immune system – due in turn not only to his premature birth but also to his hybrid identity – had been insufficient to combat these conditions.

Yet even though, tragically, Motty was no more, the very fact that he had indeed once existed was surely enough to have immortalised him not just in the media – which covered his all-too-brief life with considerable enthusiasm – but also in the scientific literature, for he was, after all, truly unique. In reality, conversely, nothing could have been further from the truth. Indeed, the lack of formal zoological interest in Motty was in its way every bit as surprising as Motty himself. To quote an extensive online history of Motty by Sam Whitbread:

"…the coverage by scientific journals was significant by its absence. Here was an animal the like of which had never been seen before and, it is almost certain, will never be seen again. Indeed, it was almost as though the world of science had chosen to turn its back on this unique event and ignore that the impossible had occurred. Specialist elephant journals and publications did recognise the birth for what it was but the International Zoo Yearbook merely made a casual mention of the birth in their reference section and IZN only carried a brief note."

Nor was that all. Following the autopsy, Motty’s skin was professionally mounted by a London taxidermist and after a short time in storage back at Chester Zoo was taken by Michael Brambell, the zoo’s director, to the British Museum (Natural History), where the zoo hoped that Motty would be placed on permanent display to be seen by as many people as possible. To date, however, he is still in storage, preserved securely for posterity but still unseen by the general public. How fitting it would now be, therefore, more than 30 years after his birth, for the zoological marvel that was once Motty to be commemorated and celebrated at last in a public exhibition, restoring to prominence a too-long-forgotten wonder who spent all too little time in our world.

Motty, an asian elephant x african bush elephant (cross-breed) at ...

Motty the african and asian elephant crossbreed

Elephant data base

White Elephant? Thailand

Three white elephants were discovered in Thailand during 1977, and were presented to King Bhumibol Adulyade. And in March 1983, an even more dramatic event took place - the discovery of a whole community of white elephants in Indonesia. Not only was it very surprising to find a community of such creatures, but also it was an equally important discovery zoogeographically, because this was the very first record relating to any white elephants in Indonesia. Plans were soon made to transfer this priceless herd to a wildlife sanctuary in order to ensure its protection - but by the time that the relocation efforts had been put into action, the elephants had moved on, and were not found again.

ShukerNature: PINK ELEPHANTS ON PARADE!

"This is the first I have heard of a whole herd of "white elephants," that amazingly have disappeared. Does anyone know any more about them? If we are to believe the illustrator below Alexander the Great was gifted with four "white elephants" as early as the 15th century."


Alexander the Great presented with white elephants. Image taken from La Vraye Histoire du Bon Roy Alixandre, early 15th century. Published in France