According to conservationists, rhino populations are starting to rebound in the species' home country of Zimbabwe, suggesting that efforts to protect the species are working.
Zimbabwe's rhino population surpassed 1,000 for the first time in more than 30 years, according to the African Rhino Specialist Group of the IUCN Species Survival Commission. These include 614 black rhinos and 415 white rhinos, which are listed as critically endangered and near-threatened on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, respectively.
According to the International Rhino Foundation, conservationists working to protect the country's rhinos have "achieved great success" despite soaring food and fuel costs. The foundation was founded 31 years ago during the poaching crisis.
Chrispher Whitlatch, a spokesman for the International Rhino Foundation, told ABC News that rhino populations have surged due to strict protection, monitoring and management of these animals. The black rhino population in Zimbabwe's Bubay Valley reserve includes pumpkins, who were injured and orphaned by poachers and continued to thrive after being released back into the wild a few months later.
During a routine patrol in July 2020, conservationists at Lowveld Rhino Trust found Pumpkin's mother, who was killed by poachers, Whitlatch said. Near her body, conservationists noticed "small bloody footprints" near her body, Whitlatch said, and they tracked down the pumpkin, which was still alive but was shot in the torso by poachers and seriously injured. She was only 16 months old at the time. Whitlatch said pumpkin's will to survive was evident from the start, as was her "courage" and "charisma." She even took a bottle from the person caring for her, an exotic concept of a baby rhino, to convince them that she would survive.
After months of rehabilitation, the pumpkin was released back into protected land in October 2020, home to most of Zimbabewe's rhinos, where she continues to thrive today, Whitlatch said. Whitlatch adds that pumpkins are regularly monitored and even met a young male black rhino of the same age named Rocky, which has conservationists hoping they will mate and breed.
However, according to the International Rhino Foundation, this year has still been a difficult year for rhinos. The Rotary International Foundation said poaching-related incarceration activities were temporarily halted due to coronavirus restrictions, criminal networks quickly adapted to new challenges, and poaching rates and transactions began to increase again this year. "Large organized crime groups view wildlife trafficking as a low-risk, high-reward crime, and during the pandemic they became more involved in the rhino horn trade, monopolizing critical networks and diverting more rhino horn," the conservation group said in a statement. ”。