Lowveldt Zimbabwe - Moving rhinos away from poaching pressures

Black rhinos that are managed within the IRF-supported Lowveld Rhino Project in Zimbabwe are still showing a net gain in numbers. The Lowveld population is now about 400, after an 8% growth rate over the past year, and there are also 140 white rhinos. However, poaching has been flaring up as the economic and political situation in Zimbabwe has deteriorated. Since 2000, the Lowveld project has undertaken 111 rhino translocations to remove rhinos from areas that are particularly prone to poaching. 

The Chiredzi River Conservancy has been particularly hard-hit by poaching. In late 2007, nine black rhinos had to be moved from this area to the safer Bubye River Conservancy, which is also in the Lowveld region, about 100 miles to the west.   

More recently, two rhino calves called Carla and Lisa-Marie had to taken along the same route. Last year Carla was orphaned at seven months of age when her mother was shot in Chiredzi River Conservancy by rhino poachers. Carla was also shot and her face cut with axes in the same attack but she survived, and was rescued for hand-rearing.

Lisa-Marie fell victim to a different form of poaching in Chiedzi River Conservancy – snaring.  The Lowveld Rhino Monitoring unit found her, at nine months of age, with a wire snare deeply imbedded in her hind leg. The injury was so severe that there was concern she would not recover in the wild, and so she was captured and moved to a nearby settlement where she and Carla were cared for by the Style family and by members of the Lowveld Rhino Monitoring Unit. Dedicated daily care, and special feed provided by SAVE Foundation of Australia, has seen both these animals make amazing recoveries.

With their injuries healed, the time came to begin the long and gradual process of returning the two to the wild. In May 2008, Carla and Lisa-Marie were trucked in crates to bomas (pens) at Bubye River Conservancy. The specially built bomas open into a yard and a large paddock so the rhino calves can get out into the bush without having to face all the challenges of life in the wild. 

A black rhino calf continues to suckle up to about the age of two and remains with its mother until she has her next calf, six months to a year after the first calf has been weaned. In addition to natural browse, Carla and Lisa-Marie are still bottle-fed milk twice a day and receive game cubes. 

Once the two had settled into the new boma and yard as their new home it was time to open the gate to the larger paddock so they could exercise more and browse naturally. As soon as they realised there was new territory to explore they confidently exited the boma and started nibbling every bush they came to. Lisa-Marie got quite a jolt when she stuck her head into the first acacia bush only to discover that some have huge thorns (only more user-friendly varieties had been presented to them in the boma as young animals can sometimes get large thorns stuck in their mouths or feet).

The two wandered off into the bush never allowing more than a few yards of distance between themselves. Next thing they were gone from sight and not seen near the boma all day only to return promptly at the time of their afternoon bottle-feed. As they have become more familiar with their environment the two seem prepared to allow a little more distance to develop between them as they browse and they are becoming more and more casual about when they bother to come home for dinner. It will be another year and a half before the paddock fencing is removed to allow Carla and Lisa-Marie to move off in their own good time to join the other 100 black rhinos in this 900,000 acre conservancy.
[photo: Carla and Lisa-Marie in the bush together]

Zimbabwe rhino management operations and rhino family life

In June 2008, the Zimbabwe Lowveld Rhino Project undertook a translocation and dehorning rhino operation in the Bubiana and Bubye River conservancies. Rhino poaching has been on the increase in Zimbabwe so a concerted dehorning program has been implemented in the hope of curbing the losses. Dehorning has shown effectiveness as a deterrent to poachers in Zimbabwe. A total of 71 different black rhinos were located over the 14 days of the operation. Of these rhinos, 13 were calves under the age of 12 months, showing the health of the population.

In management operations (as opposed to emergency translocation operations) it is not worth interfering with such young animals. There is a risk that if their mothers are darted, small calves will get separated and killed by predators. Therefore it was not felt that is was worthwhile to dehorn the 13 cows that had small calves.

Seventeen black rhinos were dehorned during the operation and 14 were earnotched to help with their monitoring. The Bubiana and Bubye River populations – which now total over 200 black rhinos – are monitored on a system of individual identification with skilled scouts tracking and photographing the rhinos to accurately record the population. Two rhinos were found with wire snares requiring surgical removal. Both injuries were not too severe and the rhinos will recover in the wild. Snaring continues to be a threat in these wildlife areas especially with economic conditions in the country worsening.

In contrast to the dehornings and the translocations that are needed to remove rhinos from areas of active poaching, the June operation also tackled the more pleasant task of dealing with an overpopulation of rhinos in one area. Five young black rhinos were translocated out of the fenced Ripple Creek section of Bubye River Conservancy and were released into a larger section of the same conservancy.

The five animals that were moved are young rhinos but are no longer dependant on their mothers. However, this does not mean that they would be alone, as black rhinos are far more social than is generally realized.  During this operation two young brothers (Fairchild - 6 years old and Kanjan – 4 years old) were found together with their mother (Diniwe) and her one year old calf plus another cow and her calf along with an additional sub-adult (most likely the calf of Angeline the neighbouring cow).  Seven black rhinos in one group.

While looking for Cruiser (the three year old son of Juliet), the rhino monitors found his six year old sister Mazda with two calves – a one month old and an 18 month old. Only the smallest calf was actually hers – the 18 month calf belongs to Teresa – a cow who lives in the same area and is often found very close to Juliet and her calves. Tandeka is another cow that lives in the same area as Juliet and Teresa. Tandeka and Juliet and both their calves have been seen together. These close associations outside the mother-calf pair have been observed often.

Juliet, Teresa and Tandeka were all originally translocated from the same area of Bubiana Conservancy, into Ripple Creek. They were captured and released on different days but records show that their capture sites were all within three miles of each other and it is most likely that they associated with each other.  Many of the rhinos moved from Bubiana to Bubye River have established home ranges in proximity to rhinos that they lived near when they were in Bubiana – even when they have been translocated in different years. The social bonds of rhinos are some of the most interesting features of these closely monitored translocation exercises.