Rhino dehorning ‘stressful but short lived’ says SANParks
Senior Veterinary manager for the South African National Parks (SANParks), Peter Buss says that although the dehorning of rhinos is stressful to the animal, the stress is often short-lived.
Buss was speaking in Skukuza, Mpumalanga where park rangers dehorned a rhino.
“You know what I explain to people is that yes, it’s a stressful event because suddenly you have a helicopter flying over them and then a dart hits them and a helicopter flies next to them. It’s a very acute stress and what I mean by that is that it’s very short term. So, all of us are designed to deal with short-term stresses and so once this animal recovers and the whole event is done then there are no residual effects at all,” he says.
It's been estimated that over 100 rhinos have been poached at the 2 million hectares park this year.
One ranger also lost their life in the line of duty in 2022.
Buss says that dehorning the rhino is one of the interventions done by SANParks to discourage poachers.
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“What this means is that we cut off as much of the horn as we can without injuring the rhino. And the reason we do that is that we feel that will increase the risk for the poacher. They will less likely to want to poach the rhino because the risk is too high for the gains that they gain from it.
“So, what we did today was that we immobilized the rhino, and we re-dehorned the rhino. Once annually we try to re-dehorn them and keep the horn as short as we can.”
This week, mining giant Anglo-American donated four Hawk batwing aircraft to aid conservation and the fight against poaching.
The much-needed aircraft come at a cost of R3.8 million.
Anglo American Platinum executive head of projects, Prakashim Moodlar says the aircraft donation is an important step for improved biodiversity and wildlife conservation in the Kruger National Park.
“In our own business we are committed to ensuring a healthy environment as part of our Sustainable Mining Plan and we understand the power of working with others,” says Moodlar.
“Building a safer, cleaner and more sustainable future can be achieved through collaboration and knowledge sharing that comes from partnering with like-minded organisations such as SANParks.”
