Heartbreak as two South African rhinos die after reintroduction to the wild

Two of six critically endangered black rhinos have died of unknown causes five months after being flown from South Africa to Chad in a pioneering project to re-introduce the animals, officials said Sunday.

Rhino in Chad were wiped out by poaching nearly 50 years ago, and the six were intended to establish a new population in the country after intensive anti-poaching measures were put in place to protect them. The South African environment department and Chad government said in a joint statement:

“We can confirm that these two (a male and a female) were not poached. However, the exact cause of death is not yet known.”

In July, there was widespread outrage after 11 black rhinos in Kenya died after having been transferred to a sanctuary, mainly due to toxic levels of salt there.

The rhinos in Chad had been roaming free in Zakouma National Park after a gradual acclimatisation process. Their carcasses were discovered on 15 October.

The surviving four are being closely monitored, the statement said.

South African rhinos die in Chad

In May, the six rhinos were sedated with darts and flown from the Addo park in South Africa to Chad, in special steel crates, accompanied by vets checking their stress levels.

The high-profile transfer was hailed as major conservation breakthrough.

There are fewer than 25,000 of all species left in the wild in Africa due to a surge in poaching, and only 5,000 of them are black rhinos, who are rated as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

They are targeted to feed a booming demand for rhino horn in China, Vietnam and other Asian countries, where it is believed to have medicinal qualities.

Northern white rhinos disappeared from Chad several decades ago and the last western black rhino was recorded there in 1972, after decades of poaching pushed both subspecies to local extinction. The animal was re-introduced to Rwanda in 2017.