Sudan’s death may spell end of species
KENYA: Sudan, the last male northern white rhinoceros, has died in Kenya, spelling almost certain extinction for one of Africa’s iconic species.
Sudan’s death leaves only two female rhinos of the species, Fatu and Najin, neither capable of natural reproduction, at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya, where Sudan lived out his final years.
The three rhinos were sent to Kenya in 2009 from Dvur Kralove Zoo in the Czech Republic in the hope they would reproduce. Hopes rose in 2012 when two of the rhinos mated, but the cow did not become pregnant.
The best chance for bringing the species back from the edge of extinction is in-vitro fertilisation using eggs from the surviving females, stored semen from dead males, and a surrogate female rhino from another subspecies such as the southern white rhino.
Rhinos have been in danger for decades because of poaching by criminal syndicates for rhino horn, which is sold illegally mainly in China and Vietnam.
The range of the northern white rhino was in central Africa, including Democratic Republic of Congo and the Central African Republic, where myriad militias often rely on income from illegal trafficking of minerals, wildlife products and timber.
The western black rhino, last seen in northern Cameroon, was declared extinct in 2006 after a survey of rhino populations in Africa. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature warned at the time that the world was on the brink of losing the northern white rhino. By 2008, the species was considered extinct in the wild.
Sudan was 45 years old and could no longer stand up. He had been treated for age-related degeneration of muscles and bones, as well as extensive skin wounds. The decision to euthanise him was made on Tuesday by a veterinary team from Dvur Kralove Zoo, the conservancy and the Kenya Wildlife Service.
Ol Pejeta chief executive Richard Vigne said he hoped Sudan’s death would focus global attention on the need to preserve species from extinction.
The last wild northern white rhinos lived in Garamba National Park in northeastern DRC, but fighting and poaching in the 1990s and 2000s wiped out all but a few. In 2005 the DRC government agreed to move five surviving rhinos from the park to Kenya for safety, but the plan was never carried out.
The Institute for Conservation Research at San Diego Zoo has mounted a project to try to bring the northern white rhino back from the brink of extinction. Researchers at the zoo aim to use genome sequencing and stem cell technology to create embryos, with southern white rhinos as surrogate mothers.