Day 12: Shopping and Rhinos!

July 28, 2022

Today we got to start a bit late, with a nice cooked breakfast at 9:00! We did some last-minute shopping in town, grabbed lunch to go, and headed back to our lodge.

After a few minutes of free time, we followed Jessica to our next job: Dehorning 3 rhinos. Due to the enormous threat posed by rhino poachers, no individuals involved are identified, and our work site cannot be disclosed. This particular site is breeding southern white rhinos in the hope of preventing this species from becoming extinct. They had had good success keeping them secure until recently: There have been 3 poaching there in the past 3 weeks. Typically, a poaching team consists of 3 (or more) members, a shooter, equipped with a heavy duty sniper rifle with a night scope, security, equipped with machine gun and sidearms, and a runner, who, if they encounter any issues is to take the horn and run.

Only days ago, the staff were awakened by the sound of gunshots. Sound echos oddly in the bush, with random rocky outcroppings causing weird echos and making locating the source of gunshots very difficult. The bush is rugged, mostly untracked, and it is very, very dark out here at night, with essentially no light pollution for nearly a hundred miles. So chasing armed trespassers, lighting your way with a flashlight that makes you into a target, is a risky undertaking at best. In this instance, the staff were able to locate the poachers within the many thousands of acres in the reserve. The rhino was already dead; she was a female (cow) that had been dehorned only that morning. The poachers had killed her to take only the small remaining nub of horn “root” and some of her sinus cavity.

The staff held the poachers at bay for several hours until the local Farm Watch (like neighborhood watch, but with trucks, guns and dogs) could respond, blockading the perimeter of the reserve. When the poachers finally attempted to flee, they were caught by members of the Farm Watch and turned over to local police. Unfortunately, the system can be pretty corrupt, and often these criminals are released after only a day or two in jail.

The really sad thing is that rhino horn has no magical nor medicinal properties; it is made of keratin, similar to a dog’s toenail or a cow’s horn. But a few pounds of horn can yield hundreds of thousands of Rands, tens of thousands of dollars. In a country where poverty and corruption are all too common, the temptation can be overwhelming.

In attempts to stop the waste of the lives of so many rhinos, the sale of rhino horn has been made illegal. Unfortunately, this has had the effect of inflating the price due to scarcity. Currently, literally tons of rhino horn are being held in secure vaults awaiting legalization of trade. At that time, this horn will be released to flood the market, driving prices down to a point where poaching rhino no longer pays. As South Africa also continues to battle poverty and corruption, the incentive to poach will decrease further.

Many local organizations are working on the ground here to save southern white rhinos. Please, if you are concerned with this issue, support local efforts in which people are involved who truly understand the situation and live with its results daily.

Tranquilized rhino (darted from helicopter) being monitored post-dehorning. In addition to dehorning, each rhino is microchipped for permanent identification, ear notched for visual ID, and blood, hair and tissue samples collected for entry into the National rhino DNA database.

Helicopter view of a large crash of rhino. Without action, we may be among the last to ever see such a sight.

(I confess, there was an empty seat in the helicopter returning from our last dehorning site, so I graciously volunteered to fill it. Gerry from Big Game Heli is amazing!)

3 rhino skulls. The one on the left is shown with its front horn in place. The 2 skulls on the left died of natural causes. The skull on the right is from a poached rhino, and you can see that the horn was cut off right down into the sinuses. Marks from the axe used to remove the horn are visible in the surrounding bone.