Endangered white rhino dies at San Diego Zoo

A zoo statement Sunday said Nola – an elderly female – was euthanized following surgery for a bacterial infection linked to an abscess on her hip, the AP reported.

“We´re absolutely devastated by this loss, but resolved to fight even harder to #EndExtinction“, the zoo said in a statement.

San Diego zoo is working on a programme to use six southern white rhinos – recently arrived from South Africa – as surrogate mothers for northern embryos, a project scientists say may take 15 years.

A rare northern white rhino has died in San Diego Zoo Sarafi Park, leaving just three across the world. After a long time battling old age and her disease and with all medical care, Nola became more ill last week.

Genetic material from a dozen northern white rhinos has been preserved at the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research, for future reproductive opportunities, zoo officials said.

Nola’s death is also a blow to the northern white rhino sub-species.

The last three known northern white rhinoceroses live at the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya, where they roam in a 70-acre enclosure, protected by armed guards 24 hours a day. Many people expressed their condolences to the zoo and shared memories of Nola through Facebook. The hope was that the zoo could save the species by breeding them, but it never happened. According to Rawstory, there are two females and one male but Sudan (the male rhino) is way too old to reproduce sexually.

The northern white is a native of Uganda, Chad, Sudan, the Central African Republic, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo – countries where war have decimated the rhino’s natural habitat.

The San Diego Zoo mourns the loss of its only northern white rhino and said, “You will be deeply, dearly missed”.

The San Diego Zoo has a dedicated mission to bring endangered species “back from the brink of extinction”.

SIMON LAUDER: The Western Black Rhino was declared extinct just a few years ago.