Importing South-central black rhinoceroses

The minor black rhino population in the US is still managed, just not by the AZA. Like others have said, 2001 was quite a long time ago and demographics are not at all the same. The crutch to managing this subspecies was the two black rhino subspecies were competing for holding space in zoos and a lack of female calves born to the population.

 

So, who is now the species coordinator for the ex AZA minor rhinos?
I know several zoos in Mexico went into the subspecies due to AZA "intransigience" .. I suppose the CS2C organisation picked up the pieces here ... (linked also with the US ranches).

 

I also noticed from the studbook (2001), that Europe holds (holded) more female Eastern black rhinos (24.48), and USA holds more males (40.27), so the number of females in Europe was almost twice than that in the US.

http://www.rhinoresourcecenter.com/pdf_files/126/1260101330.pdf


The situaton in 2008 in Europe was 29.48 (maybe some exchanges occured with the US)

 

But main purpose of the thread was about south-central black rhinoceros and it's fate in zoos; it would be great lost if they go unmanaged in US zoos; Australia manages them and needs them; And what is the probability for some future new imports from their native countries and establishing managing population also in Europe, with new holders who wish to hold black rhinos, and the Easterns are not readily available and difficult to obtain from other zoos.

The eventual futurue population of south-central back rhinos in Europe (like for example represented with 5.5 indviduals in let say, 4 holding zoos) would be managed together with the Australian one, and with that in the US, and also with zoos from South Africa.

 

As I mentioned earlier, Fort Worth holds most, if not all, of the South-Central Black Rhinos in the US so I'd imagine they're the coordinators of the program.

Personally, if the US isn't going to focus on the subspecies anymore, I think it may be a smart alternative to send the animals to Australia. Surely their population could use the boost and the bloodlines.

~Thylo

 

Fort Worth indeed coordinates the program. Disney's Animal Kingdom has several individuals, though.

 

Hopefully that will remain as it is; responsible task for Fort Worth zoo.

 

Why would it be the same. I would say that it is much more important to manage one subspecies (that 99% of you probably would not be able to tell apart from the other) properly, then trying to have as many as possible. From an ecological perspective both are just black rhino and I think that a southern black rhino into East Africa would do about just as well as an eastern black rhino. Let's say that if all black rhino in Africa go extinct, small chance to that I think given the fact how well protected they are in some refuge areas. Then re-introducing eastern black rhino all over Africa would not make much of a difference, except the loss of some genetic diversity. For example here in Kenya multiple parks have southern white rhino and they fulfil their ecological function well and would probably thrive if there were not so many poachers....

 

Does anybody know if there has been any genetic study on black rhino populations and whether there is any real difference between Eastern and Southern African populations (and for that matter the now deceased Western subspp)?

 

Good question. As the subspecies name implies (D. b. minor) the South-central black rhinoceroses should be the smallest of the black rhinos or at least smaller than D.b michaeli.

 

According to this article there is some degree of genetic differentiation between the extant subspecies:

http://www.rhinoresourcecenter.com/pdf_files/127/1272377164.pdf

And the different subspecies were off course investigated by Groves and apparently there are some differences in the skull, though sample sizes were relatively small.

 

Thank you lintworm for the link. Surprisingly too, that D. b. michaeli animals are geneticaly more diverse than more-widely distributied D. b. minor.

 

Thanks, to be honest I have read just the abstract, sometimes I don't have enough time.