Conservationists in Kenya are in mourning after the death of a white northern rhino, which has left the species with a single male. Gillian Orr charts the other species on the brink
Wednesday 22 October 2014
While routinely checking on the four northern white rhinos that roam the 90,000 acres at Kenya's Ol Pejeta Conservancy the rangers found that one of their males, Suni, had died of natural causes.
At 34, Suni had managed to reach the same age as his father before him, and it is not considered a particularly premature age to go. But while there was great relief that this "gentle giant" hadn't fallen prey to poachers, news of his death on Friday has catastrophic implications: there are now only six of this particular subspecies of rhino in existence. Even more worryingly, Suni was considered to be the last breeder. The only other male, Sudan, who is also at Ol Pejeta, is too old and weak to mate.
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