Rhino Poaching

From today's news.

Claudine Renaud
Mokopane - Rhino will be wiped out from South Africa's wildlife parks by 2015 if poaching continues at its current rate, a campaigner fighting to save the animals has warned.
And corruption among officials is contributing to the ongoing slaughter, said veterinary nurse Karen Trendler.
In a career spanning almost two decades, 50-year-old Trendler has raised 200 baby rhino orphans at a wildlife sanctuary in Pretoria, earning the nickname "Mama Rhino."
She is planning to open a special treatment centre for them, warning that the situation has become critical.
Poachers nabbed 448 rhino last year, and in the first three months of this year the toll stood at 109 - in other words, a kill-rate of more than one a day.
While the poachers target the adult rhino for their horns, baby rhino often die too, unable to survive alone.
The sharp increase in poaching has raised concerns among experts that the animals could disappear from the wild within the next four years, Trendler said.
"You hate to sound alarmist, you hate to even consider that it could happen. But if the poaching continues at the current rate we could eventually see rhino go extinct.
"There are predictions that by 2015 we could have no rhino."
Corruption
The problem has been exacerbated by the fact that some people working in wildlife conservation and animal welfare have been implicated in the lucrative poaching industry, Trendler said.
"There are some incredibly good guys in the business who are doing amazing things and who would give their lives for those rhino.
"But unfortunately we do have an element of corruption. There have already been prosecutions and arrests, where government officials are complicit."
The booming market for rhino horn and increasingly sophisticated poaching methods help explain the devastating death-rate, Trendler said.
"There is a growing economy in Asia, so there is more disposable income to pay for Chinese traditional medicine.
"There is easier accessibility, poachers have better technology, so using cellphones and GPS they can move the horn that much quicker through the process.
"On top of that there's the sinister part of it where it's actually being stockpiled against extinction.
"So they just take up as much as they can get and it's held in stockpile for the time when the numbers drop and the value of the horn goes up," Trendler said.
Some private owners are even pushing to have the trade in rhino horns legalised, arguing that prohibition has done nothing to stop poaching, something that Trendler vehemently opposes.
She is busy building a rhino orphanage at a golf and leisure resort near Mokopane, in Limpopo.
Minimum human contact
Presented as South Africa's first non-commercial and non-tourist rhino orphanage, it will have an intensive care unit with incubators, drips and surveillance cameras.
A small team of carers will look after the baby rhino, and human contact will be kept to a minimum because the aim is to release them back into the wild.
Once they are strong enough to leave the unit, they will be introduced to their "surrogate parents", a pair of adult rhino who live in the resort's game park, Trendler said.
"We've had phenomenal success in the past with rhino who are naturally very nurturing or who have a lovely nature who'll take on calves and become a friend or a companion," she said.
"Given the characteristics of the two rhino that are here, we believe they are probably going to form bonds with the calves."
- SAPA

my first reaction after reading this article and the length good people will go to protect rhino's is that this poaching is unfortunately a very sad,sorry and shamefully to the human race, true tendency of our times [greed?]

this is a very shocking statistic that more than one rhino a day is poached for 15 months now in south-africa alone...wow!

i know my suggestion while my blood is still boiling just thinking of it [poachers] may sound 'cruel' and drastic, and violate all kinds of 'human rights' of the 'poor,underved and disadvantaged' poachers but....
in other parts of africa there is a shoot to kill policy on poachers in effect,
and shooting them on sight is legal there and nothing to be frowned upon..

it's not as if the poachers don't know what they are doing is wrong, [i've got experience with this one!]
and for sure they will hide behind some lame excuses like 'eish,by mistake,but we were hungry..
.but then they only took the horns and left the meat to rot!

being illegal aliens from another country on top of that ,armed with dangerous , unlicenced AK's that they are currently not shy to use against farm owners and game officials alike when spotted/cornered, also dont go down well when the law protect a poacher's 'rights'!


is shooting poachers on sight too drastic a measure?
maybe,but what is the alternative?
[corruption up till the highest branches also doesnt help in bringing this problem under controll!]

'when does an animal's life become worth more than that of a human life?'

it is a thought provoking question, and maybe not such a popular 'solution' as it definitly got some moral issues as well...
induvidual thoughts on this will vary,but maybe its time we start to think along these lines?
it was maybe easy to answer this question not that long ago,, but now? [or not,,,,,,?],

good luck to this lady!

Here's hoping her efforts and program work.

Been a couple of interesting takes since. The Army is patrolling Krueger now, and they seem to like to use their guns, been killing a lot of poachers. It also appears that a lot of these cases are inside jobs with cops and game people. They closed in on a reserve manager this last weekend and he killed himself. KZN has been very active and it seems like our poaching count is down. Unfortunately it just seems to have been moved to other areas.

Don't be out in Kruger after dark.

Rhino poaching has become a major and critical issue, which the powers that be will have to tackle head on. They will need to look at legislation and allocating the required resources to protect the rhino on the ground and to prosecute those committing the crime. I am not sure what statistics you may have seen, but below is apparently the official numbers to date (media statement released on the 19th March 2012):
LATEST RHINO POACHING FIGURES:

SA	2010	2011	2012
KNP (SANParks)	146	252	75
MNP (SANParks)	0	6	3
GP	15	9	0
LIM	52	74	17
MP	17	31	3
NW	57	21	15
EC	4	11	3
FS	3	4	0
KZN	38	34	18
WC	0	6	1
NC	1	0	0
TOTAL	333	448	135

NUMBER OF ARRESTS:

South Africa - Arrests	2012	2011	2010
KNP (KNP)	20	82	67
MNP	0	0	0
Gauteng (GP)	10	16	10
Mpumalanga (MP)	29	73	16
Eastern Cape (EC)	0	2	7
Limpopo (LP)	3	34	36
North West (NW)	15	21	2
Free State (FS)	6	0	0
KZN (KZN)	5	4	25
Western Cape (WC)	0	0	2
Northern Cape (NC)	1	0	0
Total	89	232	165

Makes for some interesting reading. There has been talk on placing a monitorium on rhino hunting, but this would be a major mistake and will end up compounding the problem. The reason why rhino numbers grew substantially on private properties was because they had value, and they contributed significantly to the greater meta-population. Placing a monitorium on hunting will have the opposite effect, as their value will decrease drastically and the very reason and incentive why the private land owner kept and managed populations of rhino will be removed. Something to think about!

Malcolm,

And for what it is worth, the owners of Leeukop were the first to stock Rhino back in the Biosphere. They have to be very careful with them as they are walking distance from Swaziland, a great lot of poachers.

Shoot them & leave them lay! Just like the poachers do the Rhino! They know the risk & I do believe will be the only way to stop it - if that even does it! I also believe there are corrupt people on the inside assisting the poachers - it has to end!