Much of the news from the Natural World is negative. The human population is growing in crowding out the Natural World, even when not foolish two positions have led close to the Extinction of animals because of supposed benefits that their body parts will bring humans.
One of the worst hit were rhinos. The African rhino population is divided roughly speaking into 2 two species the white rhino and the black rhino. Over the last couple of decades white rhino conservation in southern Africa has been highly successful taking an almost extinct animal two to the point where it numbers over 10000 animals in the wild ( the northern white rhino has been less lucky and is clinging on with few animals left).
However the black rhino has not fared as well. These two animals behave very differently. The white rhino takes its name from a mistranslation of the Afrikaans word Weit which means wide, so named because it has a wide mouth suitable for grazing grass. This means that where white rhino were found they are relatively easy to see as they tend to be out on the plains. Black Rhino on the other hand the browsers the eat twigs and other things and as such are generally found deep in the bush out of sight.
This potentially has proved to be an advantage as there are still small pockets of black Rhinos spread out across much of Africa though species such as the Western black rhino has been lost.
6 years ago a survey was done and they found the 4845 black rhino still lived in the world. This survey was read and recently giving a total population of 5360 or an annualised increase of about 2.5% a year.
This is an incredibly impressive increase though we have to remember the Black rhino would have want to numbered in the hundreds of thousands across most of Africa so there is still a long way to go.
Furthermore while their overall position is improving, poaching has not stopped. What perhaps currently plays to the conservationists advantage is the fact that there are so few black Rhinos left, there are not many poachers who will go out actively hunting them- any better now lost I generally a bonus for poachers looking for other more common species.
