The Great Rhino Rescue: Saving the Southern White Rhinos
TROUBLES The fireball sun is low in the sky Though night is coming hot air still shimmers over the savanna in South Africa's Kruger National Park A large female Southern white rhino plods through the lengthening shadows while her young calf trots beside her
With a huff and a grunt the mother rhino stops and her calf stops too She bends her big head to the ground and nips off a mouthful of grass to chew The calf noses beneath the mother's belly by her hind legs and begins to nurse For this calf all is now right with the world But the mother's ears twist to home in on an unusual sound in the rustling grass At first a baby rhino has only bumps where its horns will grow That way it doesn't hurt its mother while nursing
No wild predators are a threat to her but hunting lions or a pack of hyenas could hurt her baby And even though the mother rhino doesn't see well enough to spy what's sneaking through the shadows she has a keen sense of smell When she sniffs a scent she knows means danger she grunts The pair bolts Rhinos can run as fast as 31 miles 50 km an hour but only for short bursts
From the time it's about a month old a rhino calf mimics its mother and nibbles on grass learning to graze Pffffft A dart stabs the mother rhino's rump She keeps running kicking up a dust cloud Then she staggers stumbles and crashes down as her front legs fold under her Her baby races to her and bumps her with his nose The mother huffs and puffs but doesn't get up The calf cries a shrill squeal as tall thin creatures come closer And closer illegal hunters called poachers have shot the female rhino with a tranquilizer dart and she is unable to move What will happen to the Southern white rhino and her calf
