Brave Hope may get male mate

Depressed rhino needs some company

FOUR-YEAR-OLD rhino Hope, who had half her face hacked off in a poaching incident a few months ago, is so depressed that her guardians are looking to bring in a male rhino to keep her company.

Hope has been at the Shamwari Game Reserve’s wildlife rehabilitation centre since the horrific attack in May, undergoing procedures every three weeks to assist in her recovery.

She was the sole survivor of a savage attack at the Lombardini game farm, near Jeffreys Bay, where poachers cut off half her face to remove her horns.

While veterinary nurse Megan Sinclair said Hope was doing well, she said the rhino was still traumatised.

“We are looking into getting a male rhino to keep her company because she’s been quite depressed,” she said.

Sinclair said while Hope was well on her way to recovery, she had days when she was extremely sad and reserved as she roamed her enclosure.

The rhino has undergone a series of costly operations – estimated at about R500 000 to date – to try and reconstruct her face, which was so badly injured that her survival was seen as a miracle.

Her first operation saw veterinary staff at the rehabilitation centre having to scrape off maggots before the initial surgery.

Wildlife Foundation conservation programme director Matthew Norval said: “It was a difficult decision to make, whether to keep her alive or put her down.

“She’s doing quite well, but she still needs a lot more operations.”

Norval said they were in talks with Lombardini owner Johan Lottering to get a male rhino from the farm to be with Hope at Shamwari.

Despite millions of rands being pumped into rhino conservation in South Africa, rhino poaching remains on the rise, with this year’s figure expected to be slightly higher than last year’s.

So far, about 800 rhinos have been poached this year, compared to last year’s figure of just more than 700.

Fourteen of those poached were in the Eastern Cape.

The Wilderness Foundation and Volkswagen South Africa’s partnership – through a R2-million sponsorship of six Amarok vehicles – brought the fight against rhino poaching home to the public yesterday.

Four people were given first-hand experience of the work done to try and curb poaching.

The group got a once-in-alifetime opportunity to join members of Shamwari’s antipoaching unit, staff and veterinarians to collect DNA samples to be added to the rhino database in Pretoria.

This helps trace the origins of rhino horn in a bid to help with convictions in rhino poaching criminal cases.