[Maru]

World's last male northern white rhino dies
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-k...source=twitter

World's last male northern white rhino dies

NAIROBI (Reuters) - The world’s last male northern white rhino has died, the Kenyan conservancy taking care of it said, leaving only two females of its subspecies alive in the world although scientists still hope they can save it from extinction.

Ol Pejeta Conservancy said in a statement it had made the decision with wildlife officials and his previous carers to euthanize on Monday the 45-year-old rhino, named Sudan, due to the rapid deterioration in his condition.

Sudan was being treated for age-related complications that had affected his muscles and bones and also gave him extensive skin wounds.

The rhino had spent two weeks in late February and early March lying in his pen due to discomfort from a deep wound on his right hind leg.

“His condition worsened significantly in the last 24 hours; he was unable to stand up and was suffering a great deal,” Ol Pejeta said. “The veterinary team from the Dver Kralove Zoo, Ol Pejeta and Kenya Wildlife Service made the decision to euthanize him.”

Sudan had previously lived at the Dver Kralove Zoo in the Czech Republic before being transported to Ol Pejeta Conservancy, about 250 km (155 miles) north of Nairobi, where he lived with the last two females of the same species, 27-year-old Najin and 17-year-old Fatu.

After all attempts at getting him to mate naturally failed, conservationists last year put Sudan on dating app Tinder, hoping to raise enough money to pay for a $9 million fertility treatment.

It said scientists were also seeking ways to do in vitro fertilization.

“The only hope for the preservation of this subspecies now lies in developing in vitro fertilization techniques using eggs from the two remaining females, stored northern white rhino semen from males and surrogate southern white rhino females,” it said

While there are thousand of southern white rhinos still roaming the plains of sub-Saharan Africa, decades of rampant poaching have drastically cut numbers of northern whites.

Poachers can sell northern white rhino horns for $50,000 per kilo, making them more valuable than gold.

Kenya had 20,000 rhinos in the 1970s, falling to 400 in the 1990s. It now has 650, almost all of which are black rhinos.

[Niamh.]

[Cal.]

So sad

[Kazanne]

How sad,did we have a hand in that?

[Nicky91]

this makes me so sad

[Niamh.]

Originally Posted by Kazanne

How sad,did we have a hand in that?

I'd imagine any animal with Ivory tusks we had a major hand in unfortunately

[montblanc]

[Livia]

It's stuff like this that makes me sure mankind will eventually wipe itself out. Let's hope we don't take too many more species with us.

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by Niamh.

I'd imagine any animal with Ivory tusks we had a major hand in unfortunately

I just wondered as it was a white one you'de have thought they would have been endangered and protected more.

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by Livia

It's stuff like this that makes me sure mankind will eventually wipe itself out. Let's hope we don't take too many more species with us.

So true Livia,we have not been very good to the planet so far and we seem to get worse , everyone just doesn't seem to think the worst will ever happen,but for sure it will.

[Livia]

Originally Posted by Kazanne

So true Livia,we have not been very good to the planet so far and we seem to get worse , everyone just doesn't seem to think the worst will ever happen,but for sure it will.

It's only 200 years since the industrial revolution, and since then we've raped and pillaged this planet... and we think we're so bloody advanced.

[Crimson Dynamo]

killed by superstition/greed/ignorance

[Mystic Mock]

Originally Posted by Livia

It's only 200 years since the industrial revolution, and since then we've raped and pillaged this planet... and we think we're so bloody advanced.

Tbh you're right in what you're saying.

People can be selfish and evil in alot of things that we do to the animal kingdom just for our own benefit. You take the advanced technology away from us and alot of us would probably turn into barbaric animals and start showing our true colours.

It's ashame what's happening to the Rhinos, Tigers, and Snow Leopards and any other animal that's endangered.

[user104658]

Originally Posted by Livia

It's only 200 years since the industrial revolution, and since then we've raped and pillaged this planet... and we think we're so bloody advanced.

That's the scariest part really. Millions of years of natural history, 6000+ years of human history... and we've managed to cause untold damage in the last couple of short centuries. I doubt we can even imagine what we're capable of in the next 200 .

[Nicky91]

Originally Posted by LeatherTrumpet

killed by superstition/greed/ignorance

so true


why can't people be more gentle to animals

[Cherie]

this is awful, to see an animal like this become extinct in our lifetime is so depressing

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by Cherie

this is awful, to see an animal like this become extinct in our lifetime is so depressing

It is Cherie ,for all we think we are superior and clever we can be the most stupidest of people sometimes , we can't seem to leave anything alone, it's so very sad.

[Underscore]

Humans...

[Ammi]

Originally Posted by Livia

It's only 200 years since the industrial revolution, and since then we've raped and pillaged this planet... and we think we're so bloody advanced.

..this is so true, Liv...the human species ‘advances’ in some ways but it’s at the ‘expense of’...or disregard of...?...so many other things...when all must be protected../...all life...



...Sudan.....he was a beautiful beast...rhinos are one of my favourite animals...My grandad always used to say I was like a rhino barging around and bumping into this and bumping into that...sadly, protected species can’t always be protected...because of so many different things in countries...we talk so much about humans ‘fleeing countries../war torn countries etc..’...with immigration etc...but animals can’t flee, they can’t leave to ‘self preserve and flourish’ ..and can’t always be protected in their environment...so very sad...

[Eddie.]

How certain species are dwindling at an alarming rate worries me.

[Kazanne]

This sums it all up for me,and the same will happen to other animals.We should be ashamed.

[Niamh.]

Originally Posted by Kazanne

This sums it all up for me,and the same will happen to other animals.We should be ashamed.

Such beautiful animals

[MTVN]

There are still two female northern white rhinos alive so they're not extinct yet, I think they're looking into ways of artificially inseminating them

[Kazanne]

Originally Posted by MTVN

There are still two female northern white rhinos alive so they're not extinct yet, I think they're looking into ways of artificially inseminating them

I know but he was the last male,and if this insemination doesn't work,what then? We shouldn't really have to do things like that anyway.

[Livia]

Heartbreaking.