Rhino poaching

today we are going to talk about rhino poaching.  this doesn't affect any of us in the states, but it is a big area of concern over in africa where one rhino is being poached every 19 hrs.  keep this rate up and rhinos, especially the black rhino, will be extinct in just a few short years.

white rhino

rhino are being poached for their horns, which bring $65,000 US/kilogram.  put that into foreign currencies and you've got a fortune.  most of the market goes to vietnam as they believe the horn, ground, will have some sort of medicinal purpose.  also in china, rhino horn knives are a symbol of "coming to age" (or something like that)



when we were there-- poachers were out and about and killed 2--a momma and a baby.  the poachers go onto the reserve, shoot the rhino in pure daylight and literally hacksaw the horns off and run.  why can't they catch the poachers?  these reserves are huge.  imagine tracking down a poacher if you have 220,000 acres of bushland to go through. 

although hard to see, this guy was poached a couple of weeks before we were there.  you can't see its nose--which is just sawed flat off.  now hyena, dog, lion---anything is fair game to feed on this.

reserves also just lost all of their government funding as well.  this puts much financial stress on the reserves to keep their properties lined and safe.  (what happened--govt officials were going on game hunts as "company parties," and the reserves were rather angry about it.  the reserves took the govt officials to court and won.  in return, the officials decided to take away the govt funding).  tourism alone will not support these reserves.  anyone want to donate?

1 month old baby white rhino.  his momma was poached 

.

normally i'd blow off rhino poaching as it doesn't affect my life one way or another making chocolate.  but once you see a poached rhino--it's a different story.  one that is completely heartbreaking.  if a momma is shot the baby will stay by it's side.  at one of the reserves we went to they had a 1 month and a 2 month old with poached moms.  they're still bottle feeding at this age and drink about 9L of milk/day.  although there is hope for these little guys it would be better if they were out in nature- not in the bomas (holding pens) with humans.     stop rhino poaching!