By Myrta Pulliam
The Indianapolis Star
November 19, 2000
It was, in essence, a shopping trip in the most extreme of ways
-- a mall the size of Massachusetts, carts the size of motor homes,
a bargain only the most ardent of hunters could afford.
But this adventure was a safari to South Africa's Kruger National
Park to search for white rhinos for the Indianapolis Zoo, which
plans to open an exhibit and launch a conservation program for the
threatened species.
Funded by zoo patrons, last month's hunt for the white rhino (
ceratotherium simum) resulted in five of the animals being captured
at the South African game preserve. Three of the rhinos will take
up residence in Indianapolis in 2003 when the zoo opens a rhinoceros
exhibit where elephants now roam.
"This trip represents everything that is right and current
with the zoo world today," said Jeffrey Bonner, president and
chief executive officer of the zoo and one of 11 people from Indianapolis
who accompanied Kruger's game-capture team on the trip. "This
is pure science and completely exhilarating."
Indianapolis Zoo officials decided more than a year ago to pursue
a rhino exhibit. The idea grew out of planning for a new $7.3 million
elephant exhibit. Once the zoo's seven elephants are in their new
home, the area they now occupy will be modified for the white rhinos.
Cynde Barnes of Indianapolis, a member of the zoo's board of directors,
and her husband, John E. Barnes, are paying for the rhinos. They
went along on the expedition to South Africa to find them.
Of the $250,000 raised for the rhino capture, $75,000 went to Kruger
and another $75,000 will cover the cost of flying the animals from
South Africa to the United States.
"This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us," John
Barnes said of their donation and the trip.
The Barneses and nine others from Indianapolis made the trip to
pick out the zoo's newest residents. The trip marked the first time
that representatives of a zoo had been allowed to watch as animals
destined for their facility were selected and captured.
The excursion provided a rare glimpse inside Kruger's game preserve
and how its curators select and capture specimen animals that will
be shipped to zoos and parks -- and subsequently used in efforts
to help save endangered species.
Others have examined the rhinos after a capture, but "we got
an unbelievable experience -- just what you would see on National
Geographic ," said Debbie Olson of the Indianapolis Zoo, who
arranged the trip.
"I think, through this experience, we also opened the door
for other institutions, as they found it was a pretty positive thing
for all concerned."
Why does the zoo want rhinos?
For one thing, Bonner said, the animals will fit nicely into the
zoo's current elephant exhibit once the elephants are relocated.
Also, he said, rhinos -- both black and white -- are in trouble
and threatened by extinction. The Indianapolis Zoo's successful
artificial insemination program for elephants -- it has resulted
in two births -- could help cre ate a stable community of white
rhinos. (Black rhinos are rarer and therefore unavailable at this
time.)
"We hope we can do for rhinos what we did for elephants,"
Bonner said.
Kruger National Park stretches over 5 million acres on the northeastern
edge of South Africa. One of the world's largest and oldest nature
sanctuaries, the 102-year-old park is renowned as a well-managed
preserve that focuses on research.
Kruger has an abundance of wildlife, and park officials have worked
out an efficient system to capture, ship and sell rhinos -- factors
that have caught the attention of zoos and game parks worldwide.
Dr. Douw Grobler, Kruger's chief veterinarian, estimates that some
600 rhinos have been captured and relocated in his 12 years at the
park. Most are sold to other game parks in southern Africa, but
some go to zoos around the world.
The collection assembled on this trip will consist of 10 rhinos
-- the three for the Indianapolis Zoo; a male and two females for
Busch Gardens in Tampa, Fla.; and two females for a private reserve,
Peace River Refuge, in Florida. To make sure they end up with enough
animals for their clients, Kruger officials usually collect a few
more rhinos than needed. Any extra animals will be relocated or
sold.
Kruger sells its rhinos for several reasons, Grobler said. The
park has a surplus of white rhinos now, so the program raises money
for the preserve.
But, he said, generating funds is only part of the equation. Another
goal is to ensure there's a safe and stable rhino population abroad
-- particularly in U.S. zoos -- in case something happens to the
now-healthy population in Kruger.
A healthy zoo population, he said, means an active breeding population
-- something that could allow the species to survive a widespread
disease or some other catastrophe in the wild that could drive white
rhinos to extinction.
The capture
Although the relocation of elephants, particularly lone elephants,
is a controversial practice no longer endorsed by U.S. zoos, rhino
relocation has not stirred protest, primarily because the animals
adapt so well to their new surroundings.
Grobler says that while the initial capture is probably traumatic,
"white rhinos are very adaptable as long as they have good
grass."
Kruger National Park's game-capture team makes it look easy --
taking just 20 minutes to spot a rhino by helicopter, dart it with
an anesthetic cocktail and load it into a transportation crate.
The day starts early -- 3:30 a.m. -- for the capture team of a
dozen or so people.
By sunrise, the team is in place. The helicopter arrives to meet
the rest of the group's vehicles: two huge flatbed trucks equipped
with hydraulic lifts and carrying three metal rhino crates, several
other trucks and cars, tons of heavy equipment, huge chains -- and
a lot of rope.
This day, Grobler, the head veterinarian, is in charge. He's in
the back seat of the four-person helicopter. The spotters fly in
a square pattern over an area where Grobler and the pilot, Fanie
Jordaan, know they are likely to find rhinos.
On the ground, the vehicles line up and wait for the chopper to
locate the appropriate rhinos. Indianapolis has requested a male
and two females, ranging in age from 3 years to 5 years. Within
about 20 minutes, the crew in the air spots the first female.
The helicopter hovers as Grobler prepares an anesthetic cocktail
known as M99, a potent blend containing a morphine derivative and
a tranquilizer, azaperone. The dosage must be appropriate for the
size of the rhino, and Grobler has judged this one to be between
2,400 and 3,200 pounds.
Even 100 feet off the ground, the crew knows the rhino is in the
right age range, judging from the size of its body, neck and horns.
Grobler inserts the syringe into a dart, which is loaded into a
rifle with no scope -- a gun so simple it looks like a child's toy.
He then slides open the helicopter door and shoots the rhino in
the backside. He rarely misses.
As the dart strikes the rhino, the beast begins running. The chopper
follows, working to keep the rhino pointed toward the road, where
the ground crew waits.
After about 10 minutes, the drugged rhino slows down and eventually
collapses. The helicopter, which seems capable of landing anywhere,
lets Grobler off a few feet from the animal. The capture team arrives.
The rhino, out cold on the ground, is first blindfolded. Then a
rope is attached to her horn.
Giant tug of war
As soon as the rhino's vital statistics are recorded and a metal
crate is positioned in front of the animal, Grobler begins choreographing
the people who will push the massive beast into the crate.
The animal is given a shot with a "partial antidote"
to the anesthesia. She's still groggy. Grobler and two others wave
electrified sticks -- cattle prods. (The veterinarian says he knows
from personal experience that the sticks sting only a bit.) The
high-tech prods help, but getting the animal upright and into the
crate is mostly a matter of decidedly low-tech pushing and pulling.
Once the rhino is inside, the crate is lifted back on the flatbed,
and the trucks and cars head for the road.
Then the process is repeated.
When it gets too hot -- often by 9 or 10 a.m. -- the operation
stops for the day. The only casualty of this day: one dart, broken
when it penetrated a rhino's hide.
After the rhinos are in their crates on the flatbed, they are driven
to an acclimatization center in Kruger. Upon arrival, each crate
is lifted and positioned so its door is aligned with the gate of
a large pen made from huge tree posts. The crate door is raised.
Seeing the grassy pen, some rhinos amble out of their crates. A
few run out. Others snort and try to push around the other rhinos.
Before long, though, most of the animals are eating grass contentedly.
If a rhino doesn't eat in the first 14 days of captivity, it is
released back into the wild. But about 90 percent of the animals
adjust just fine, said Marius Kruger , manager of the acclimatization
center. All of the rhinos collected last month are eating well.
In March or April, eight of the 10 rhinos now in the acclimatization
center are expected to travel to the United States by air. To ease
the adjustment, the veterinarians and zoo staff members who will
accompany the rhinos on the plane will start feeding and watering
them two or three weeks before the trip.
Until the Indianapolis Zoo's rhino exhibit is ready in a few years,
the animals destined for the facility will stay at another, as-yet-undetermined
U.S. location.
Only after the rhinos are ensconced in their new Indianapolis home
will zoo officials truly conclude what was, in essence, a shopping
trip in the most extreme of ways.
Myrta Pulliam is a member of the Indianapolis Zoo board and director
of special projects for The Star. Contact her at (317) 444-8008
or via e-mail at myrta.pulliam@starnews.com
About this story
Staffers from The Indianapolis Star and WTHR (Channel 13) traveled
to South Africa's Kruger National Park last month with a contingent
from the Indianapolis Zoo.
The group's mission: to help capture three rhinoceroses that will
reside in the zoo's first rhino exhibit, scheduled to open in 2003
in what is now the facility's elephant area.
Myrta Pulliam, The Star's director of special projects, produced
most of the words and images that make up this special report.
WTHR news anchor John Stehr and photographer Steve Starnes, meanwhile,
assembled a three-part series that details the difficult task of
locating, capturing and acclimating the rhinos destined for the
zoo. That series -- Out of Africa -- will air at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m.
Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
At a glance: zoo's plans
The rhinos bound for the Indianapolis Zoo can thank the elephants
for their new home. Here's why:
The zoo's elephants will be moving to larger digs -- an exhibit
area built with $7.3 million that zoo officials have raised quietly
in the past few months.
The fund-raising campaign encompasses nine projects, the largest
of which is the new elephant exhibit. It also includes the conversion
of the old elephant exhibit into a rhino area.
Construction has started on the new elephant area in the southwest
corner of the zoo, near Washington Street and the administration
building. That project will take more than a year to complete, so
the elephants probably won't move until summer 2002.
Then the rhino-exhibit conversion would start. Plans call for that
area to be done by early 2003 -- with the rhino exhibit opening
to the public that summer.
Converting the elephant area to a rhino exhibit will cost about
$200,000. Zoo visitors probably won't notice many of the changes.
The area's pond will be made shallower -- and therefore safer for
rhinos, which don't swim as often or readily as elephants. In addition,
the moat around the area will be made more substantial.
Many of the behind-the-scenes changes involve the barn where the
rhinos will be kept when not outdoors. The elephant barn was designed
for free contact, meaning the elephants and their handlers could
be in the same area. The rhinos, in contrast, will be separated
from their handlers. Zoo staffers will be able to reach the animals
through special chutes.
Zoo officials also know they'll have to be flexible with the layout
and structure of the rhinos' pens.
"We don't know enough about the role of competition between
males and what makes them breed," explained Jeffrey Bonner,
the zoo's president. "Males may need competition before they
breed, or they may need to see one another but not be in the same
pen, or they may need to be together, or may need not to see one
another."
African rhinos
The two species, the black and the white, are similar in appearance.
Here are some of their differences:
White
Weight: 4,000 to 6,000 pounds
Diet: Grazers or (eat grasses) "lawnmowers"
Characteristic: Wide, square chin
Population: 11,170
Conservation status: Threatened
Black
Weight: 2,000 to 3,000 pounds
Diet: Browsers (eat leaves, fruits, flowers)
Characteristic: Pointed upper lip
Population: 2,940
Conservation status: Endangered
Rhino facts
All species of rhinos are in jeopardy, mostly due to poaching.
There are also three Asian species: the Indian rhino, the Javan
rhino and the Sumatran rhino.
African rhinos have two large horns, they are similar in color,
have poor eyesight and good senses of smell and hearing.
African rhinos have a 30- to 40-year life span.
Rhino horns are made of keratin, similar to fingernails or hooves,
which regrows if broken off.
Rhinos are poached for their horns, which are used to make medicine
in Asian countries and dagger handles in Arab countries.
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