Double loss as pregnant rhino slain by poachers

Cow killed for horn near Komani was due to calve in few weeks

POACHERS shot dead a pregnant rhino and hacked off her horn in a nature reserve outside Komani this week. Lawrence de Lange Nature Reserve manager Hein Gerber said yesterday the fiveyear-old white rhino had been due to calve in two to three weeks.

“One rhino is bad enough. We were very shocked and it is a great loss. But with her being pregnant, in fact we have lost two animals,” he said.

Initial investigations showed the poachers used a .375 calibre hunting rifle to shoot the animal before chopping off its horn with an axe either late on Christmas night or before dawn the next day, he said.

The carcass was found 60 to 70m from the reserve’s southern fence, which runs along Olivier Road, near the cemetery.

The access point through the fence had not yet been pinpointed but it was clear that the poachers had got into the reserve and had not shot the animal from the road, he said.

The 1 200ha reserve was proclaimed in 1982 and named after local commonage ranger Lawrence de Lange, who led the team that did the fencing and game introduction.

Today it is owned by the Enoch Mgijima Municipality and for part of the year it is closed for hunting.

When it was open to the public, the rhinos and giraffe were particular attractions, Gerber said.

People visit to use the picnic site and tourists and visiting families flock in during holidays.

The reserve was patrolled every night by a local corps of honorary rangers but it was not surprising they had not spotted the poachers, he said.

“This was not local people who did this. This was a professional job.”

Gerber said he could not divulge any further information, but the police were following clues.

While dog poaching was a problem at one stage at Lawrence de Lange, that had been addressed and the reserve had not suffered any rhino poaching before.

Not far away at Wildschutsberg Game Reserve, also near Komani, however, five rhinos were killed in two separate incidents in October.

The latest killing at Lawrence de Lange means 12 rhinos have been killed in the Eastern Cape this year. Nineteen were killed in the province last year.

Countrywide, since 13 were killed in 2007, the number of rhinos slaughtered by poachers rocketed to 1 215 in 2014.

Since then figures have declined slightly and 1 054 were killed last year.

In July, in her last rhino poaching statistics announcement this year, Environment Minister Edna Molewa said 529 rhinos had been killed country-wide by the end of June.

Corné Roeloffse, of Tranquil House B&B in Komani, said the Lawrence de Lange rhinos were much loved by the residents of the town.

“People often stop on the side of the road to watch them and in winter they throw vegetables over the fence to give them extra food.

“My mom saw them just the other day when she visited the reserve, so we are shocked to hear the news.”

Another resident, Arno Kruger, said the lights of the patrolling honorary rangers could be seen every night on the high ground in the reserve, a comforting sign that the rhinos were being taken care of.

“So this is terrible. I could not believe it when I heard,” Kruger said.

Responding yesterday to questions, police spokeswoman Captain Namhla Mdleleni confirmed the incident and said a case of illegal hunting was being investigated.

Provincial Green Scorpions chief Div de Villiers said a member of his team had been assigned to assist police on the matter.

‘ One rhino is bad enough. We were very shocked and it is a great loss