The rhinoceros is a vegetarian and mainly eats foliage and twigs. It can weigh up to three tons and reach the age of forty. It does not have a good eyesight, but its senses of hearing and especially smell are well developed. Its only enemy is man.

Game Parks: There are not many rhinos in the Kruger National Park (South Africa), so anyone with a particular interest in seeing them, should perhaps rather visit the Umfolozi Game Reserve in Natal (South Africa) where they have succeeded in breeding this endangered species. Rhinos also occur in the Augrabies Falls National Park (South Africa), in the Addo Elephant Park (Eastern Cape, South Africa), the Pretorius Game Reserve (Free State, South Africa) and in the Etosha National Park (Namibia).

Rhinoceros

Today, both rhino species (black rhinos and white rhinos) are threatened by extinction in the whole of Africa and even in the National Parks it is difficult to protect them. For instance, poachers get into the Kruger Park by crossing the 300 km long border to Mozambique which is not easy to survey, and manage to keep on shooting rhinos.

Conservationists have, as a desperate resort, taken to anaesthetizing the animals and cutting their horns off to make them unattractive to the poachers. It is the horn which fetches a very high price on the black market, since Japanese men in particular believe in taking it in a pulverized form as a potency remedy.



Top: Black Rhinos. Centre and Left: White Rhinos. All Umfolozi Game Reserve, KwaZulu-Natal.