With just two females left, northern white rhinos are effectively extinct.
These animals are now – barring a miracle of science – impossible to save. Their closest cousins could share the same fate, unless we act fast.
Other subspecies of rhino are in almost as desperate a state – with just 950 eastern black rhinos, and 30 Sumatran rhinos left in the wild.
Please donate now and help stop history repeating itself. With your support, we can provide the remaining wild rhinos with the protection they desperately need.
Why are northern white rhinos almost extinct?
Throughout the last century, the northern white rhino population has been obliterated for their horns, which are sold as traditional medicines and status symbols across the world.
When much of Central Africa suffered armed conflicts throughout the 1970s and 1980s, this poaching surged to unbearable levels.
It proved too much. By 2008, there were only eight left.
A Herculean effort from joint conservation forces attempted to restore the lost populations, but the numbers were too low and the challenge too great. In 2018 the last male died, officially ending any chance of natural survival.
Peter Esegon, one of the rhino caretakers, watches over Najin, one of the last two Northern white rhinos, as she naps in her holding area at Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Central Kenya. © Justin Mott / Kindred Guardians Project / We Animals Media
In 2018, Sudan, the last remaining male northern white rhino, passed away of natural causes at the Ol Pejeta conservancy, Kenya.
Can northern white rhinos be revived?
There is still some hope. Before they died, genetic material was taken from males and stored.
That material has successfully been used to make a viable embryo when it was combined with an egg from a southern white rhino (a closely related subspecies).
The hope is this can now be implanted into another rhino, and work can begin restoring the legacy of this once great subspecies.
But we must be realistic. This will not be an easy task, and the numbers should never have been able to get this low.
We must stop this happening again to other species.
How northern white rhino extinction happened
Northern white rhino. © Mark Carwardine / NaturePL
One of only two northern white rhinos remaining.
What is Fauna & Flora doing to save rhinos?
If we’re going to save rhinos, we have to stop poaching. Everywhere that rhinos live, it remains a very real danger.
In order to stop it, Fauna & Flora is supporting vital conservancies that deploy rangers from local communities to protect rhinos from any illegal activity.
Through your donations, we’re able to supply these rangers with the vehicles, protective equipment and training that they need to keep rhinos safe.
On top of this, we’re helping dog-handling teams to track signs of poaching, and providing technology such as drones to help monitor them.
What do rangers need?
The conservancies where rhinos live are enormous, and rangers need to constantly be on the move to look for any sign of imminent poaching.
To do that, they need off-road vehicles, fuel, mechanics and spare parts so that they can be ready at a moment’s notice.
For the rangers themselves, a long expedition is impossible without raincoats, rations and a comfortable pair of boots. They need everything you’d expect for days of trekking into the wild – first- aid kits, water purification tablets, hammocks, machetes and stoves.
Dog-handling teams need constant subsistence and training for their canine companions, while each dog is equipped with the protective equipment needed to keep them safe in the field.
With that equipment in hand, these teams have proved to be incredibly effective forces for conservation in areas where they’re properly funded. With your donations, we can equip more of them to protect more rhinos.
What your gift could do
£91
could help pay for a vehicle repair - ensuring teams are not grounded if a crisis were to emerge.
£48
could help pay for the protective equipment for a dog, keeping them safe whenever they’re needed to deter poachers.
£22
could help pay for equipment for one community ranger, including waterproofs, boots, a backpack and a torch.
Why Fauna & Flora?
Fauna & Flora is one of the most experienced rhino protection teams on the planet. We have been working with these animals for decades, and have helped their population stabilise in countless difficult areas.
If we can take that tried–and–tested expertise and roll it out across more of the rhino’s historical range, we can help bring these animals back to the numbers they once knew.
Please donate now, and together we can ensure we never face a world where rhinos are confined to the history books.
Najin and Fatu touching noses. © Ol Pejeta Conservancy