Our Hearts Ache for the Rhino

6.28.12

Hello almal! (“Hello everyone” in Afrikaans). Today I want to introduce you to one of the largest problems facing South African wildlife today: rhino poaching. Sadly, I was ignorant of this issue before I came to South Africa—I was under the impression that elephants were poached for their ivory and the carnivores were poached because they killed farmers’ livestock. I have also heard of wildlife populations being inevitably decimated when their habitats are destroyed to create farms.

Rhino are poached for their horns. Two years ago, only 20 rhino were poached per year in South Africa. The rate has dramatically increased to a rhino poached every 19 hours. The rhino is in grave danger, and I do not think most of the world even knows about it. Of course, I can’t speak for everyone. I am sure (and desperately hope) that many Americans know about the poaching. I certainly have not heard much media about rhino poaching in the United States, and I am someone that watches the news daily.

There are many suspicions about which countries have the largest market for rhino horn in South Africa, but we do not have definitive answers because official research is still being performed. Many rhino conservation organizations such as Rhino Revolution (rhino-revolution.com) send members abroad to discover what the local people believe about the beneficial effects of rhino horn. They also visit the markets to discover whether the selling of rhino horn is prominent. Then, information is shared between organizations. The suspicions about rhino poaching are, at this point, just rumors because the proper research has not yet been performed. However, I want to share some of the suspicions with you even though I generally do not think spreading rumors is a good idea. In this case, I believe that spreading awareness of the problem is the most important thing.

According to Rhino Revolution, poaching increased after a Vietnamese minister declared that rhino horn cured him of cancer. It is believed that rhino horn has magical powers as a cure all and aphrodisiac in Taiwanese and Vietnamese cultures. Families will keep a rhino horn over their mantle and scrape a bit off whenever a family member becomes sick. Another market exists in Saudi Arabia, where rhino horn is a state symbol for princes and Sheikhs. When a prince reaches manhood, he will receive a dagger with a rhino horn as the hilt.

For a while, South Africans believed that the Chinese provided a large market for rhino horn, but the Chinese government recently agreed to help South Africa preserve its precious rhinos.

Unfortunately, government penalties for poaching do not serve as an adequate deterrent. A rhino horn will sell for much more than the fine for possessing a horn or poaching. Poachers receive only a few years of jail time, and when they are released, they return to their previous habits. According to one person I spoke to, a rhino horn can sell for $100,000. For poor people in developing countries, the profit is a large attractant to the poaching trade.

The market is so strong that a museum in London that housed a stuffed/preserved rhino was broken into; they tried to steal the rhino’s horn. The rate of poaching is so large that a sizable group of farmers and game rangers that own reserves collectively decided to dehorn their rhinos. If the rhinos no longer have horns, the poachers have no reason to kill them. The horns are kept in a safe in a secret location, and the rhino populations on ranches are kept secret as leaking of such information could draw poachers to the area.   

Today, after I initially drafted this post, I discovered that another rhino was poached today. It was a rhino that had been dehorned. What does this mean? We tried to dehorn the rhinos to protect them from poaching. The poachers are so frustrated with our anti-poaching efforts that they decided to kill the rhino anyway out of spite. Poaching the dehorned rhinos serves two purposes for the poachers. 1) If a poacher tracks a rhino for three days and discovers that the rhino is dehorned, then by killing it, the poachers destroy the chance that they will track the same rhino again. 2) Killing the dehorned rhinos makes the rhino a more endangered species, which makes every horn they sell worth more money. It makes me sick. 

The citizens of South Africa are terrified that one of their most majestic, iconic animals will be lost forever from the greed and superstitions of humans. The South African government is so slow at passing legislation that South Africans fear that by the time any protective legislation is passed, the rhino population will be too small to be sustainable. What will happen is that the small population will lead to limited genetic diversity. Limited genetic diversity leads to inbreeding, which then leads to deformities and degenerative diseases. At this point, the species cannot be saved (unless some new biological technology appears in the next several years).

Are there any other anti-poaching preventative techniques that do not involve dehorning the rhino? On my first day on the job, June 27^th, I learned about several techniques from Dr. Peter Rogers of Provet Wildlife Services, with whom I am working for the next 6 weeks. Cassie and I met Dr. Rogers and his vet-tech Janelle at the clinic at 6:30 am. We drove to a game reserve in Hoedspruit and were met by a helicopter pilot, the warden of the reserve, and the warden’s team. We drove in the backs of pick-up trucks through the reserve until the helicopter spotted an untagged rhino. The helicopter landed to pick up Dr. Rogers, who re-found the rhino and then darted it with a drug cocktail made of etorphine hydrochlordie (M99), hyaluronidase (Hyalase), and azaperone (Stresnil). M99 is a strong tranquilizer with ten thousand times the strength of morphine. Hyalase speeds up the absorption of the M99 by dissolving the material binding the muscle fibers to allow the M99 to disperse over a larger surface area. Stresnil is a neurolepic sedative that calms the animal.

The rhino walked around for 5 minutes and then fell down. The tranquilizers reduced the rhino’s blood oxygen to 40%, which is unsustainable for life, so Dr. Rogers reverses the tranquilizer slightly to increase the rhino’s blood oxygen. If Dr. Rogers is still concerned that the rhino is having trouble breathing, a drug called Fresenius (Dopran) will help the rhino breathe. We covered the rhino’s eyes with a blanket and I put lubricant in the rhino’s eyes. This is an important step whenever an animal is under anesthesia because the animal cannot close its eyes. If the eye is dry for too long, then the eye may be damaged.

The first anti-poaching technique was instilling three microchips in the rhino: one in the shoulder, one in the front horn, and one in the back horn. In order to instill microchips in the horns, Dr. Rogers drilled a hole in the horn, put in the chip, filled the hole with a wooden piece, and then wood glue to close hole. The microchip in the shoulder was inserted with a large needle. The microchips allow the rhino and its horns to be electronically identified in the event that the horns are taken or the rhino is killed. However, the locals believe these are tracking devices and so may be more reluctant to take the horn out of fear of being tracked and caught. This is not the case but the authorities prefer that the locals believe this rumor.

The second anti-poaching technique was the collection of DNA samples. Cassie, Janelle and I took hair from the rhino’s tail, shaved pieces from a toenail, blood from a vein in his ear, and shavings from a horn (the horn is not purely keratin and contains DNA), and Dr. Rogers took a piece of his ear as well. Hopefully, with all of these samples, a complete DNA profile of the Rhino can be constructed. Having the rhino’s DNA is extremely important. Without DNA, a poacher can only be prosecuted for the possession of a horn, not for the poaching of the rhino itself. DNA can be taken from the horn confiscated from the poacher to identify the owner of the rhino and deliver a larger legal penalty to the poacher.

The final anti-poaching technique we performed was notching the Rhino’s ears. To some people, this may seem brutal or cruel, but you must know that the rhino was not in pain because he was under anesthesia. We made small circular and triangular notches in the rhino’s ears that matched its identification number. This allows the easy identification from a helicopter as well as if the rhino is injured or poached. It also sends a message to poachers that they may have a greater chance of being caught if they poach this particular rhino—if the owner took the trouble to notch the ears, the owner may have taken other preventative measures as well. Dr. Rogers made the notches, and I followed behind him and padded all of the areas that were cut with potassium permanganate. These small black crystals caused a cauterization reaction to stop the bleeding capillaries. Dr. Rogers made me perform this task without gloves as my initiation. Since I had blood on my fingers from padding the ears, the cauterization reaction occurred on my fingers as well! It burned a bit and caused the black to remain on my fingers despite my best attempts at washing them. Later I discovered that scrubbing my fingers with a pumice rock and putting on a fresh coat of nail polish seemed to do the trick.

We also administered an injectable antibiotic to prevent an infection from the ear notches or injection sites. If the rhino had any pre-existing superficial wounds, we sprayed them with chlorhexadine, a common disinfectant used to treat open wounds. We also administered a bit of Stockholm Tar to help heal the wound. The tar has an antibacterial effect and acts as a fly deterrent.

When we finished treating the rhino, we administered reversals of M99. The animal antidote is diprenorphine hydrochloride (M50/50). However, this drug in the white rhino tends not to be  as effective; the M99 will actually recycle in the rhino and it will fall back asleep. In order to prevent this, Dr. Rogers also uses the human version of the antidote, naltrexone (Trexinol), which lasts longer in the rhino's system to prevent the recycling of M99. Both of these drugs were administered through an IV catheter in the ear. As the rhino woke, he was very groggy! He blinked a few times and looked at us, obviously confused. He curiously wobbled towards our trucks, and then eventually became bored of us and wondered off into the bush, as good as new.

We went through this process for three rhinos today, all of which were male. The day before I started working, Dr. Rogers treated an additional six rhinos with Cassie and Janelle. That’s a total of nine rhinos that they have protected on this reserve. We have plans to do more rhinos on another reserve this weekend. Janelle will not be there, so Cassie and I will be able to put our wildlife vet-tech skills to the test! I am very much looking forward to this weekend.

To find out more about rhino conservation in South Africa, please visit rhino-revolution.com. I plan on uploading an anti-poaching video with footage I have recorded while working with Dr. Rogers. Keep a look out for it. If you would like to see photos of me treating the rhinos, check out  my Facebook page. 

Sincerely,

Aria

No comprendo (I think).

6.27.12

Thank the deities above, I received my luggage at 4pm today, and thankfully, nothing was stolen! This is an important lesson to learn—don’t worry about things you can’t control. It only wastes time and emotional energy. Somehow I find that I’m pretty good at doing that. I swear I’m working on it.

There are so many differences between the culture in the United States and the culture here in South Africa. The most surprising thing I’ve learned so far is that no one in this country takes malaria pills. They say that they don’t need to. Perhaps South Africa is different from other African countries, because according to the locals, malaria is very rare here. Even though none of the locals take the pills and it’s winter right now (so mosquitos are dormant), I’m still going to take my pills in order to keep my friends, family, and myself from worrying. I think that’s a reasonable decision on my part.

The second most surprising thing I’ve learned is that I can’t understand anything that anyone says. This surprises me because the official language of South Africa is English. There are three types of South Africa accents: British, Afrikaans, and the African tribal languages. While I’ve found that the highest rate of comprehension occurs while speaking to people with British accents, I still get incredibly confused on an hourly basis due to their use of different terms, such as “petrol” for gas, “chips” for fries, and “porridge” for oatmeal. I learn at least ten more every day. It is always an embarrassing, albeit hilarious, moment when the Brits and I have misunderstandings. Most of my conversations with my British host family proceed as follows:

HOST MOM: “Would you like some porridge?”

ME: “Sure! (pause) What’s porridge?”

HOST MOM: “Well, it’s this!” She pointed to a transparent jar with oats.

ME: “You mean oats?”

HOST MOM: No… (pause) “What does porridge mean to you?”

ME: “Is it like oatmeal?”

HOST MOM: “…oatmeal?”

ME: “You know, when you put water in oats and stir it around.”

HOST MOM: (excited) “Yes, yes; it’s similar to that, I think.”

ME: “Oh, ok, great!”

Pause.

HOST MOM: “Would you like some porridge?”

ME: “Yes thank you, I would love some porridge.”

Ah, how I love the Brits. I’m lucky that my host family is British because at least they can understand the most important questions, such as, “Can you check if I broke the shower?” and “Do you have skim milk instead of whole?” Speaking of skim milk, I learned today that the Hoedspruit supermarket only receives three pints of skim milk per week. My host mother bought me one of these quarts because I’m not fond of the “full cream” that the family normally drinks. Before I knew about the infrequency of milk delivery, I drank half the pint in one sitting. Oh bother. Mama-at-home, I miss our gallons.

The second easiest accents to understand are those of the African tribes. There are so many African immigrants in the United States that I’ve actually gotten used to the accent over the years, because at Harvard, all of the taxi drivers are African. Who knew that grabbing a taxi back to the Quad after a night out would help me in South Africa. I’m glad to have such a rich educational experience behind me. I’m able grasp the general concept of a sentence, but the details are always fuzzy. That’s do Harvard, that’ll do.

The hardest accent for me to understand is Africaans, party because I’ve had no experience with it before. The American entertainment industry loves to showcase all sorts of exotic accents: Italian (Moonstruck), French (Lumiere from Beauty and the Beast), Greek (My Big Fat Greek Wedding), German (every Hitler movie), British (every movie based in the Renaissance time period or on a Shakespeare play), Japanese (Memoirs of a Geisha), Native American (Pocahontas)…the list goes on. But Africaans has very little exposure. The only popular American movie I can think of right now with Africaans accents is Invictus…and they weren’t even strong accents. The accents here are strong. Like on South African Airlines. For 14 hours.

ATTENDANT: “What would you like to drink?”

ME: “What?”

ATTENDANT: “Would you like a drink?”

ME: “What?”

ATTENDANT: “A drink.”

ME: “I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”

MAN NEXT TO ME: “He’s asking if you want a drink.”

ME: “Ohhhhh. Can I please have tea?”

ATTENDANT: “creamnsugar?”

ME: “What?”

ATTENDANT: “Do you want creamnsugar?”

Pause.

ME: “I really just don’t know.”

ATTENDANT: “Ok.” He started pouring cream into my tea.

ME: “NO, please don’t do that! Can I just have sugar?”

ATTENDANT: “Sure.”

Phew. I spent a lot of lingual and emotional energy on that plane. Hopefully within the next week, surrounding myself with Afrikaans speakers at the vet will help me become more familiar with the accent. Right now, I just look like a confused American. But I’m rocking it. Just like I rock my tangerine shorts.

Peace until next time,

Aria

I Wish I Was on Southwest

Hello everyone! Welcome to my second blog post. There are a couple of disclaimers I must make before posting. I have very limited internet access in Hoedspruit, South Africa, so my of my posts will be posted a few days after I have written them. I’ll try to be as current as I can. Also, I plan on uploading some video-blogs and pictures, so keep a look out for those as well.

6.26.12

After traveling for 31 hours, I am finally in Hoedspruit, South Africa. It has been an exhausting and frustrating day, but somehow, I got through it. Thank goodness, now I’m fed, comfortable, and have a cat sitting on my chest purring. I’m in my happy place. But before I tell you how AMAZING this place is, I have to tell you about my journey over here.

United Airlines is the devil. Not only do they falsely advertise, but they lost my luggage for the second time in a year. First let’s talk about their false advertising. My friend Tyler and I were sitting in the Dulles terminal awaiting our flight to New York City (JFK) from which we would fly to South Africa. We both had one carry on and one personal item. There was a sign immediately in front of us confirming that we had the correct amount of luggage with us. However, a grumpy United representative came onto the loudspeaker and said that we could only bring ONE item aboard the aircraft, and that they would have to check the other, because the aircraft was too small. I was pretty upset for two reasons. First, If United Airlines had properly planned ahead, they could have alerted customers when they bought their tickets that they could only bring one item on board. Clearly, United Airlines does not plan ahead. Second, United Airlines had previously lost my baggage during a family vacation to Yellowstone National Park. Thus, refused to trust them with my second precious bag that I had purposely carried with me due to its important contents: my Harvard sweatshirt, my Puppy (a stuffed animal I had since birth), and a goodbye present from my boyfriend Jack. All three items were extremely important to me and I refused to let them out of my sight.

So, when the non-English-speaking United Airlines representative approached me to tell me that I couldn’t bring both bags, I simply said, “No. That’s not happening.” He smiled and repeated himself, but I just waved him off and said, “NO.” I waltzed onto the plane with both bags even though the flight attendants protested. There was plenty of room for both of my bags.

You may be thinking that I was being belligerent, and I’ll admit that maybe I was. But sometimes, belligerent people are right. I later found out that my distrust of United Airlines was completely warranted, for on my next flight from New York to Johannesburg, United Airlines lost my two checked suitcases. Incompetent people!!

This is how it happened. My parents and I woke up around 4am to make my flight at Dulles international airport. It was bright and sunny outside, but JFK airport in New York decided that there was impending thunderclouds and that we could not leave. This delayed us for an hour. Normally, this would not be a big deal. I mean, an hour is just an hour. However, I had a connecting flight to Johannesburg, South Africa with a planned transfer time of only and hour and a half. By the time my flight from Dulles landed an hour late, I only had 25 minutes to get to my South African flight. There were about 7 of us (Tyler Wilklinson included) that were in this situation. A United representative met us at the gate and gave us the special rush treatment. We essentially ran to the other side of the terminal, went to the front of the line at security, and led us through fenced-off areas and secret doors to get us to our gate faster. We got to the plane 5 minutes before it was supposed to leave the gate. I asked the representative if our bags made it. She said yes.

False. After the grueling 14-hour flight (during which I couldn’t sleep a wink), our bags were nowhere to be seen. A frequent traveler to South Africa came up to Tyler and I and told us that we might as well say goodbye to anything valuable in our bags. “I know the system,” she said, “They will go through our bags and take out whatever they want. Don’t expect for everything to still be in there.” I was shocked.

“But why would they do that?” I asked.

“Because,” she said, “this is Africa.”

I stood there with Tyler, dumbfounded. I hadn’t slept for almost 24 hours, I was starving, and I had just been told that some of my belongings were going to be stolen. What pained me the most was that my mom had worked so hard finding every little specific thing I needed for this trip. I was just told that all of the toiletries, clothes, new hiking boots, camping equipment might be stolen. We packed very lightly for my 8-week semi-camping trip to South Africa, which means that I desperately need everything in my suitcase. At this point, I’m extremely worried. I’m distraught that I might not have everything I need. Hopefully I will know by tomorrow the fate of my bags.

Even though the 6-hour drive to Hoedspruit was colored by my worries and exhaustion, it was still a beautiful introduction to the wilderness of South Africa! The only two animals I’ve seen so far are a vervet monkey and a Chacma baboon, both of which ran in front of our car. I met the Burns family with whom I will be living for the next 6 weeks before I go camping for 2 weeks. This family is so wonderful and welcoming! The live on a big farm and have 30 horses, 5 cats, and 6 dogs! Those of you who know me know that with each additional cat, my happiness increases by a power of two. So, you could say that I am incredibly excited right now. I can’t wait to play with the cats and ride horses every day!

I also met Cassie, my fellow veterinary volunteer. Cassie is a second year-veterinary student at Murdoch University in Perth, Australia and she’s already told me many wonderful stories about working with Dr. Rogers. She is extremely nice and I think we’ll have a great time together. Luckily, she’s offered to lend me the things I need until my baggage arrives. Even though I don’t have close-toed shoes or the proper clothes that I need to go to work tomorrow, I’m very excited to meet Dr. Rogers tomorrow and begin my South African adventure!