If you want rhinos to survive, let alone thrive, you don’t just put them into the veld and leave them to it. That sounds like a no brainer in the context of the poaching onslaught that started in South Africa in 2002 (25 rhinos killed by poachers) and reached a devastating high of 1215 in 2014.
Last year, poachers killed 420 rhinos in SA according to recorded stats and while the battle continues, anti-poaching tactics have evolved to better counter the carefully planned operations of syndicates. Poaching accounts for the decimation of most of the global rhino population; but other factors like clearing species and/or their habitat for agriculture or human settlement, climate change, natural disasters and wars also take their toll.
Wildlife ecologists like Brad Fike have been working to restore and revive decimated populations of rhino across the African subcontinent. FIke’s work is well documented and, as he notes, the poachers know exactly where the rhino are. However, by agreement, the location of his research and the actual population numbers are excluded from this account of a fascinating and informative talk he delivered at a U3A meeting at Settlers Park’s Don Powis Hall on Thursday June 12.
Fike reminded his audience of the danger of biodiversity loss not only to the natural world, but to the biosphere that supports human existence. He cited the number of species globally that are threatened with extinction at 46 300, with the rate of human induced extinction soaring from 24 species a day to 250. Globally, the rhino population (all species) was 28 000, with more than half of those in Africa, most in South Africa.
By 2006, the Western sub-species of black rhino had been declared extinct. The northern white rhino was today technically extinct and both the Javan and Sumatran rhino at critically low numbers.
The story for black rhinos was almost as dire: from around 65 000 in 1970, their metapopulation hit the low of 2 450 individuals in the early 1990s.
In the science of population ecology, “metapopulation” means the sum of different interconnected populations. Originally (for example, in the 1700s when a map of Africa that Fike displayed showed rhino populations across a third of the continent), that interconnectedness meant individuals moving between patches of habitat. By colonising new habitats, new rhino populations were established. This helped keep the population balanced and viable.
With human activity progressively blocking that movement and actively destroying the rhino population, that interconnectedness is likewise today almost exclusively achieved through human manipulation. That’s exactly the work that Fike has been central to for the past few decades.
He described the process of reintroducing black rhino to a large area of land within a thicket biome. The science of population ecology was critical to the success of that project.
The first step in the management of an endangered species, Fike said, was the responsibility to ensure that the population was secure. That meant knowing every individual animal.
Then, you have to make sure they’re healthy and happy enough to perform optimally (breeding success is the main indicator) as part of an overall meta-population strategy.
Finally, through successful breeding, the population needs to grow to the extent that it can become a donor population.
That’s where things stand today and Fike showed photographs of rhinos being captured for transport from one reserve to another. Despite the alarming appearance of it, carrying a sedated rhino by helicopter, upside down and fastened by its legs, is the least traumatic method, Fike said.
He explained details of the decades of research that has gone into bringing black rhinos back from the brink. Data – diligently recorded information about what rhinos actually eat, how they socialise, when and where they go, and more – was the bottom line for 38 years of monitoring the species.
“Consistent monitoring and interpreting of the data and the ability to monitor each individual was crucial to the programme’s success,” Fike said.
The clearest indicator of how well a particular population was doing was its breeding rate – and the programme Fike was involved in was very successful in that regard.
“A black rhino’s average breeding age is 7 years,” he said. “Ours were breeding at four-and-a-half.”
Whereas the interval between calving averages three years in the general population, these were calving after two years.
The result of the successful programme is that significant numbers of black rhino have been translocated to well managed reserves across the subcontinent, boosting the chance of their surviving as a species.
Asked to explain, Fike said an easy way to know the difference between black and white rhinos was that black rhinos carry their heads higher and are natural browsers, whereas white rhinos’ heads are lower and they’re grazers.
He repeated what he’d told one of the many visiting young researchers about what to do if a rhino charges you: first prize was a suitable tree: climb up it quickly.
If there’s nothing in sight and no way out (like a vehicle you can quickly escape in), then face the rhino and stand still until the last minute and jump to one side.
To Fike’s amazement, the researcher came to him the next day and said, “It worked!”
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This article was first published in Talk of the Town, June 19, 2025. The newspaper serving the communities of Ndlambe and the Sunshine Coast, with a weekly wrap of Makhanda news, is available at stores from early on Thursdays.
