tagged w/ rhinoceros
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The Telegraph...
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Rhino poaching: 'These animals are all too easy to kill’
A close friend of Prince William talks of the senseless slaughter of a favourite rhinoceros.
PHOTO:
Proud beast: Max the rhino on the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya Photo:
TEEKU PATEL/WWW.SOKOMOTO.COM
By Victoria Moore
7:00AM GMT 01 Mar 2012
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It’s a terribly patchy mobile telephone connection to northern Kenya when I speak to Ian Craig. We’re shouting and repeating ourselves, whole sentences vanishing frustratingly into the ether as I try to talk to the conservationist about the brutal murder by poachers of a very special and rather famous white rhinoceros called Max.
The Duke of Cambridge has said he is “appalled” by the animal’s “senseless slaughter”. As a close friend of Craig and his daughter Jecca, with whom he was once linked romantically, he has been a regular visitor to the family’s Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya where Max was hand-raised. He would have seen the rhino as it was growing up.
The Prince takes a keen interest in the plight of these animals, which are at ever-increasing risk from the poachers who sell their horns for more than the price of gold. They need protection and on a recent visit, he agreed to sponsor a black hook-lipped rhino at a cost of £6,000 a year. The beast was named William in his honour.
“Rhino are so vulnerable,” says Craig. “They have bad eyesight. They’re all too easy to kill.”
Then suddenly the line is crystal clear, as if it’s being held together by the great force of his wrath. I can hear every word he says.
“How do I feel about yet another rhino being killed by poachers who only want to sell its horn?” says Craig. “It’s such a massive, deep anger. That we have failed to protect these animals. And that the world can have such a demand for something that in real terms is just worthless. The value of rhino horn, which is thought in some cultures to have medicinal properties, is founded on myth. The case of Max highlights the fate of so many other rhino. It’s important that the world sees what’s going on because it’s very real. We need to do more about it.”
Rhino horn can be traded illegally for up to £60,000 a kilogram in some Asian countries, where it is renowned for its supposed therapeutic benefits. Over the past few years, its rising value has created a surge in poaching incidents. In 2007 in South Africa, where the rhino population is closely monitored, the number of rhinos poached was just 13. The following year it was 83; then up to 333 in 2010.
But, as Craig points out, this is not a South African but a “pan-African” problem.
Conservation has long been his passion. Kenyan-born, he converted the family cattle ranch into a rhino sanctuary back in the Eighties and went on to found the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in 1995.
In 2001, Prince William spent six weeks working at Lewa as a volunteer and has returned on several occasions since, even becoming a patron of the Tusk Trust [a conservation and community development organisation] after being inspired by Craig’s work.
Kenya is certainly a country close to the Prince’s heart; it was there that in 2010 he took Kate on the romantic holiday in the wilds during which he asked her to be his wife. And it was with the Craigs at the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy that the couple enjoyed their first, very informal, celebratory drinks after the Prince had proposed.
It was to Lewa that Max the rhino came too, as a two-week-old after Craig got a call from an animal sanctuary saying he needed a new home.
“His mother was missing, presumed killed,” says Craig, who was speaking to me yesterday from Northern Kenya where he is helping the charity Save the Elephants treat an injured matriarch called Monsoon. “We flew to pick him up, blindfolded him, put cotton-wool in his ears, and brought him home. He was hand-reared on Lewa by teams of rangers: fed every four hours on lactogen and vitamins, kept warm at night in stables, taken out during the day and walked around. Whether it’s a rhino or a Labrador, you pick up a very close bond with an animal. Max became like a dog. He knew people. He wasn’t aggressive at all.”
When he was two years old Max was moved from Lewa to the Ol Pejeta Conservancy where, in common with other rhinos, he was dehorned in the hope of protecting him from poachers.
Poaching can be highly sophisticated. As the financial stakes have become higher, so the gangs can afford to invest in more equipment, deploying helicopters as well as night-vision goggles in search of their bounty, chainsaws (to remove the horn) and shotguns. It is becoming an increasingly bloody battle between conservationists and poachers, as even the prospect of excavating a few scraps from a rhino that has been dehorned makes an animal a lucrative kill.
This was to be Max’s bloody fate in June 2011 – although news of the death emerged only this week. He was six years old when, at 3 o’clock in the morning, Craig took a phone call to say that gunshots had been heard in the conservancy. Later, Max’s carcass was found lying in the warm mud. He had been shot 17 times and poachers had sliced deep into his face in an attempt to hack out what remained of the precious stumps of his horns, leaving it a grisly mess.
“I didn’t go to see him,” says Craig. “I didn’t want to go near. I put my energies into working with the police to try to apprehend the guys who had done it.”
In Craig’s view, so much more could be done to contain the poaching problem. “The issues for elephants and for rhinos are different and not just because ivory is a luxury product for wealthy people. Elephants are free-ranging animals. It is easier to keep rhino alive in a sanctuary by paying for high levels of security. But it costs a lot.
“Kenya has been relatively successful at protecting its rhino. The number dropped at one stage to 260 and now it is three times that. The government’s been putting a lot of resources into it. But you also have to remember that’s money that could be going into schools or water.
The demand for ivory and rhino horn is coming from outside Africa. It’s a world issue – but Africa is having to pay for the protection.”
And, sadly, not every rhino is lucky enough to have a royal sponsor.
.The Telegraph...
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Rhino poaching: 'These animals are all too easy to... more
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L.A. considers putting zoo operations in private hands
Officials say the change would save nearly $20 million over five years and prevent possible closure. Critics question the savings and say the move could mean less transparency in animal welfare.
Los Angeles Zoo
Photo: Zoo patrons view a pair of Masai giraffes at the Los Angeles Zoo. Two potential private operators have expressed interest in running the zoo. (Allen J. Schaben / Los Angeles Times)
By Kate Linthicum, Los Angeles Times
July 28, 2011
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Someone else may soon be tending to the misty artificial rain forest at the Los Angeles Zoo where Bruno, a 300-pound orangutan with a wispy orange beard and a hulking frame, makes his home.
The city opened the zoo and botanical gardens in 1966, but officials are now considering a proposal to turn over management to a private operator. That means the gardeners, plumbers and other city employees who help run the zoo could be transferred to other departments and replaced with private workers.
Like any issue involving labor — or animals — the fight over the fate of the zoo has caused a considerable stir.
City officials say the change would save nearly $20 million over the next five years and rescue the zoo from possible budget reductions or even closure. But opponents of the plan question the savings and warn that privatization could mean steeper ticket prices for the zoo's 1.5 million annual visitors and less transparency when it comes to animal welfare.
The zoo plan is only the latest example of a shift in how budget-strapped officials think about "core services" and City Hall's basic obligations to taxpayers. They are also considering proposals to privatize the Los Angeles Convention Center, an animal shelter in the San Fernando Valley and several arts facilities.
Such public-private partnerships are common in Los Angeles County. The Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History are two county facilities operated by nonprofit organizations.
"It's not a revolutionary idea," said Miguel Santana, L.A.'s chief administrative officer, who came to City Hall from the county in 2009. "This model has worked across the country as a way of ensuring services are maintained in an era of declining revenues."
According to a draft proposal for the zoo plan, which the City Council's Arts, Parks, Health and Aging Committee will consider Thursday, Bruno and the rest of the animals would remain the property of the city, along with the zoo's Griffith Park grounds.
All current staff would remain employees of the city, but those who do not hold zoo-specific jobs might be transferred to other city departments. Future hires would be employees of the new operator.
Two potential operators have already stepped forward.
One is the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Assn., or GLAZA, a nonprofit headquartered on the zoo's campus that raises money for the institution, manages its memberships and operates its concessions. In 2010-11, it raised about $13 million for the zoo, according to GLAZA President Connie Morgan
The other party is Parques Reunidos, a Madrid-based theme park operator that runs 70 amusement parks, water parks and zoos worldwide.
Dave Towne, a former consultant for the L.A. Zoo, said that if a private company takes over, the face of the zoo may change. "Any private, for-profit operation is going to Disney-fy it," he said. "That's just what they do."
Towne, former director of the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle, oversaw the transition of that zoo's management to a nonprofit 10 years ago. He said private operators run the majority of the nation's major zoos and are often more successful at marketing and fundraising than cities, in part because they are less encumbered by bureaucracy.
Animal activists fear that could result in a lack of transparency. Catherine Doyle, of In Defense of Animals, said that if the zoo is privatized, "it will become even more secretive and insular."
She and others have long accused the zoo's management of not being forthcoming about animal care, and have asked that the operator be required to answer to a city-appointed animal welfare commission.
Adriana Hawkins, a zoo gardener for six years, says everyone will suffer if longtime employees are reassigned. The zoo will lose expertise, she said, and the employees will lose jobs they love.
"I don't want to go down to the harbor; I don't want to spend my life on the freeway," Hawkins said. "I have a passion for the zoo."
Santana and others have said that privatizing the zoo will allow it to flourish. A report he commissioned said that under private management, the zoo would be able to reap up to $3.8 million more each year in revenue, thanks to new opportunities for corporate sponsorship, fundraising and special events.
But City Councilman Richard Alarcon said that's all the more reason to keep control of the zoo. "If a private corporation can make it profitable, why can't we?" he said.
It costs $26 million a year to run the zoo and pay the salaries, benefits and pensions of more than 200 employees. The city contributes about $14.6 million; the rest of the budget comes from ticket sales and donations.
Officials say if the city does not privatize management, that figure could grow as high as $19.4 million by 2015. But even if it does complete a deal, the city will still contribute about $13.8 million to the zoo in 2015, according to the proposal.
The savings may be small in the short term, but Santana insists that it adds up. Next year, he and other officials will have to find a way to close a $200-million budget deficit.
.L.A. considers putting zoo operations in private hands
Officials say the change... more
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Added On August 27, 2010
South Africans try to stop poachers who hunt valuable rhinos.
CNN's Diana Magnay reports.Added On August 27, 2010
South Africans try to stop poachers who hunt valuable... more
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YOUNG GALLERY-
UK
Born and raised in London, Nick Brandt studied Film and Painting at St. Martins School of Art.
He started photographing in December 2000 in East Africa, beginning the body of work that is his signature subject matter and style. He no longer directs, devoting himself full time to his fine art photography now.
Brandt's first book of photographs, "On This Earth", was published in October 2005, by Chronicle Books, with forewords by Jane Goodall and Alice Sebold (author of "The Lovely Bones").
He has had numerous one-man exhibitions between 2004 and 2006, including London, Berlin, New York, Los Angeles, Hamburg, Santa Fe, Sydney, Melbourne and San Francisco.He now lives in Topanga, California....
Few photographers have ever considered the photography of wild animals, as distinctly opposed to the genre of Wildlife Photography, as an art form. The emphasis has generally been on capturing the drama of wild animals IN ACTION, on capturing that dramatic single moment, as opposed to simply animals in the state of being.
I’ve always thought this something of a wasted opportunity. The wild animals of Africa lend themselves to photographs that extend aesthetically beyond the norm of 35mm-color telephoto wildlife photography. And so it is, that in my own way, I would like to yank the subject matter of wildlife into the arena of fine art photography. To take photographs that transcend what has been a largely documentative genre.
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http://www.younggalleryphoto.com/photography/brandt/brandt.htmlYOUNG GALLERY-
UK
Born and raised in London, Nick Brandt studied Film and... more
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Reporting from Limpopo Province, South Africa
The baby rhino, an orphan, had barely been weaned. Her horn was only a few inches long. But that didn't stop the poachers from hacking it off.
David Uys, 33, had helped raise the rhino after her mother was killed by lightning. He called her Weerkind -- "orphan" in Afrikaans. He won't forget the sight of the bodies of the baby and two other rhinos, shot dead, their horns removed.
"I'm not a one for talking about emotions," Uys said quietly. "But it was like seeing one of your family members dead, the brutality of it."
The slain bull rhino, dubbed Longhorn, was about 35 and had a magnificent horn more than 2 1/2 feet long. The third rhino, Sister, had adopted Weerkind after her mother was killed. The three died together in November on this Limpopo province game ranch that is for tourists, not hunters, north of Pretoria.
"You're angry. You're furious. You're sad. You're crying," said Uys, the ranch manager. "Just a bundle of emotions, bursting inside."
A sharp surge in poaching in South Africa and Zimbabwe by organized gangs has devastated Zimbabwe's rhino population and threatens to wipe out South Africa's critically endangered black rhinos within a decade. South African rancher Pelham Jones warns that the more common white rhino won't be far behind unless something is done.
A report last year by the World Wildlife Fund, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and wildlife-trade monitoring network TRAFFIC said poaching had reached a 15-year high, pushing the animals close to extinction. About 1,500 rhino horns were traded illegally in the last three years, despite a long-standing ban on international trade.
Last year, 122 rhinos were killed in South Africa. Jones predicted that at the current poaching rate, 180 to 200 will be killed this year. A provisional 2009 estimate shows only 800 rhinos remaining in Zimbabwe, and 18,553 white and 1,570 black rhinos in South Africa, according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, or CITES, which maintains the ban on the trade of rhino horn.
Rhino ranchers, some of whom keep the animals to attract tourists while others rely on limited trophy hunting, are so wary about the involvement of organized crime in rhino killings that few are willing to talk publicly for fear of endangering animals on their properties. Interviews are given on condition that properties, even nearby towns, are not identified.
The ranch where Weerkind was born and killed is a lush green in the summer rainy season, with rocky hills looming into the sky. Birds with impossibly long tails seem weighed down in flight as they flutter near a pond. A red track cuts uphill through the acacia trees. Rain clouds gather, thunder grumbles, and a sudden drenching rain pours down, stopping abruptly half an hour later.
Up close, the rhinos look benign, almost bovine, ambling in the Limpopo sunshine, plucking grass, shadowed by a group of guards in camouflage carrying semiautomatics. Their small, thick-lashed eyes look sleepily docile. But their sheer size is awesome -- a rhino is almost as big as a car, weighing from 2,000 to 3,000 pounds. From a few yards away, they are terrifying.
Not for Uys, even though he's been charged countless times and once was knocked over and walked on. Afterward, he recalled, the bull looked almost apologetic.
Uys has spent his life with rhinos. At 18, he was a rhino guard, sleeping in the bush with them through violent summer thunderstorms and harsh winter nights.
"I was close enough to scratch their ears. They took me as part of the group."
When he did get charged, it was usually his own fault for getting too close, he says.
"Running away is the worst thing you can do," he said. "You can't outrun a rhino." If there's a tree or boulder, you scramble up. If there's thick enough bush, you stand your ground.
Once, photographing a newborn baby, he and a colleague were suddenly approached by the calf. The two men froze. If the mother saw them and charged, there was no bush, no trees, no boulders.
"They react to movement so if you stand completely still, they won't see you," Uys said. "The guy who was with me, his nerves didn't hold out, and he started running. The cow saw us and she came for us."
There was no time to think.
"I threw down my backpack. She smelled me there and took her fury out on the backpack," he said. It was one of his closest calls.
If you called Uys a rhino whisperer, he'd be offended by the cliche. But he does have a gift with the creatures.
The other day, he crouched low about 20 yards away from a male rhino named Benni, trying to get a look at his slightly injured foot. Another rhino, Bettie, suddenly ambled right up to him. Any sharp move would be disastrous. When she got close enough to nuzzle, he raised his hand. He pressed a fist gently just under her horn. Surprised, she wandered off to graze.
Game rancher Jones, who leads an action group of rhino owners to combat poaching, said incidents are reported every other day.
His phone beeps constantly with text messages alerting him to poaching incidents and sightings of suspected poachers.
"There's another one," he said, grabbing his phone.
The police, he said, are little help. In one recent case, they arrived four days after a group of rhinos was killed. In another, a police officer picked up an ax abandoned by the poachers, destroying any fingerprints.
The South African government disbanded the police force's endangered-species unit in 2003. The government last year promised to bring back a special-investigations unit -- but critics believe it's not enough to make a difference.
"This is our cultural heritage," Jones said. "People come to South Africa to see the Big Five, not the Big Four," he added, a reference to South Africa's five biggest wildlife draws: rhinos, elephants, lions, leopards and cape buffalo.
China's recent thrust into Africa in a rush for resources is a major factor in the illegal rhino horn and ivory trade, analysts believe, because China remains the largest market. Rhino horn, made of keratin, the same substance that forms fingernails, hooves, feathers and hair, has long been used in Chinese medicinal tonics.
Zimbabwe's collapse added to the problem, with corrupt government, army and wildlife officials reportedly involved in poaching and smuggling rhino horn and ivory. The airport in that country's capital, Harare, is reportedly a key transit hub.
In South Africa, Vietnamese diplomatic officials have allegedly been involved in rhino horn buying and smuggling. Reports in Vietnam that a government official was "cured" of cancer by rhino horn appear to have spurred Asian demand.
Many fear that the Asian market is so ancient and entrenched, there's not much a small group of farmers can do to save the species. Some support the idea of rhino farming -- regularly pruning horns, which grow back -- to meet the demand and drive down prices. Others argue that legalizing the trade would only fuel demand, putting the creatures at even more risk. After the killings of the baby rhino and two adults, Uys put his energies into Benni and Bettie. Benni, more unpredictable than Longhorn, sometimes charges unexpectedly. Bettie is docile and sweet. Uys worries about their survival almost as if they were his children, just as he once worried about Weerkind and her family.
"Longhorn and Weerkind and Sister were my passion. But since they have been poached, I have devoted all my time to [Benni and Bettie]. And now I think I love them just as much as I loved the others."
robyn.dixon@latimes.com
How to help: The Endangered Wildlife Trust is working to improve the protection of rhinos in southern Africa.Reporting from Limpopo Province, South Africa
The baby rhino, an orphan, had barely... more
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Conservationists Thursday hailed a breakthrough in efforts to save the critically endangered Sumatran rhino after a female called Ratu became pregnant in captivity.
Tests on Tuesday revealed that eight-year-old Ratu was carrying a calf after mating with Andalas, the first of only three Sumatran rhinos born in captivity over the past 112 years, experts said.Conservationists Thursday hailed a breakthrough in efforts to save the critically... more
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Please view in HQ and full screen.
Menacing, dangerous, confrontational – these beasts bellow, howl and groan!
Paintings and drawings by Gary Zaimont, from his Large Animal Series of 2007-08. “Growler” by Judith Lang Zaimont is one movement from her “Symphony for Wind Orchestra in Three Scenes”. The University of Minnesota Wind Ensemble is directed by Dr. Jerry Luckhardt in the 2004 World Premiere performance. Videography by Michael Bregman.
Score available from Subito Music Corporation – http://www.subitomusic.com - tel: (973) 857-3440 - fax: (973) 857-3442.
More about the composer at http://www.jzaimont.com and http://www.MySpace/com/judithlangzaimont.Please view in HQ and full screen.
Menacing, dangerous, confrontational –... more
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For the first time in more than 25 years, captive-bred black rhinos have been released back into the wild. Experts have hailed it as a landmark step for African wildlife conservation.
Black rhinoceroses were once widespread in Africa, but in recent years these huge horned creatures have suffered dramatic declines, thanks to poaching and habitat loss. In particular, Kenya has suffered huge losses, with numbers plummeting from an estimated 20,000 in the 1970s to some 500 today.
Those that remained were confined to sanctuaries. The Kenya Wildlife Service has been working with the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) to revive rhino numbers. And now they are confident enough to begin releasing these animals back into the wild. The BBC's Karen Allen was there to watch the first batch being returned to their natural habitat - and met some of the people who have made it all happen.
(vid clips at link) For the first time in more than 25 years, captive-bred black rhinos have been released... more
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A former poacher in Kaziranga reveals why the animal is being increasingly hunted
By Teresa Rehman
Kaziranga, (Assam) : A RARE SUCCESS story in India’s wildlife conservation record, Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, home to the one-horned Asiatic Rhinoceros and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is struggling to come to grips with a spurt in rhino killings. Twenty rhinos were poached last year, 14 of them inside the national park and the rest in areas just outside the sanctuary. The forest department has come up with the usual excuses of being understaffed and under-equipped, but the retrenchment of casual workers in the park by the previous Prafulla Kumar Mahanta regime, leaving scores without livelihood and angry at the government apathy, has also played its damaging part.
One of those dismissed workers was Golap Patgiri. Employed informally by the forest department since 10 years, Patgiri’s monthly earnings of Rs 1,500 suddenly ran dry. “We used to do everything, from patrolling to cutting grass. We assisted the permanent staff in almost everything. I had once caught a poacher red-handed,” he says. Suddenly jobless, Patgiri found himself under pressure to join the ranks of the very people he had once battled: the poachers.A former poacher in Kaziranga reveals why the animal is being increasingly hunted... more
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