Jordan's Report - Rhinoceros

Rhinoceros

The Rhinoceros is a mammal that lives on their own in the grass lands in Africa. It grows up to 4 metres tall and almost 2 metres wide. It has two horns which are like your fingernails only much harder, but they are not made out of bone. The black rhino’s skin is very thick and grey in colour. 

The countries in Africa where the black rhino lives will not let them be killed. They have reserves to help save the black rhino. In the wild the black rhino has no real enemy. Sometimes a lion will take a baby for food.

Black rhinos have good hearing and good sense of smell they use their noses to follow the tracks of the other black rhinos. The black rhino has a pointed lip. This is used to hold the plant and push it into its mouth when eating. The black rhino does not eat meat, they eat twigs, leaves, and fruit from bushes. Black rhino like to cover themselves with wet mud to stay cool; this also stops the insects from biting them. The only real danger to the Black Rhino is human who kills them for their horns. The horns are sold in countries in Asia and the Middle East, they are used in Chinese medicine are also worn by Arab men as jewellery. 

The female black rhino can have a baby when she is six years old. The baby can stand up very soon after it is born. The mother will then have another baby and the first one will go off on its own. The mother feeds the baby rhino on milk for 1 to 2 years. When the baby is one week old it will also eat green plants. The baby goes everywhere with the mother, who makes sure the baby is always safe. The baby stays with the mother until it is 3 years old. 

Black rhinos have various habitats but mainly area with dense woody vegetation. White rhinos live in savannahs with water holes and mud wallows and shade trees. Conservationists have been working hard to save the rhino and its relatives from extinction. In some cases, their hard work has paid off. However all species are not completely safe from human greed, although it is illegal to kill rhinos. 

Zoos are places where animals that are unusually wild are kept in enclosures. Some zoos have a lot of space for animals to move about they are called open range zoos. Rhinos are communally found at these places.

The Woolly Rhino was a close relative of the Modern Sumatran Rhino, it was once found in Northern Europe and Eastern Asia.  This rhino had two horns and its body was covered with thick hair. It grazed on grass and shrubs. It lived during the ice age and was probably hunted by early humans. The species became extinct ten thousand years ago.

By Jordan