Volunteers needed urgently to work in animal conservation.

Volunteers needed urgently to work in animal conservation.

Eight rhino were slaughtered by a poaching gang earlier this month in South Africa’s Kruger National Park. The animals, which included one calf, were shot before their horns - worth £60,000 a kilo on the black market - were savagely hacked from their carcasses.
‘The animals were also mutilated for their eyes and ears, while one female had her genitalia cut off,’ the International Fund for Animal Welfare’s director Jason Bell said.

‘The numbers of rhinos being poached for their horns grows and grows, with the numbers of rhinos killed in 2012 already almost double that what it was two years ago with most of those being in killed in the Kruger National Park, arguably wildlife’s best secured habitat.’
Deaths doubled: A baby rhino runs in Kruger National Park where the most animals are being killed even though it is arguably t heir 'best secured habitat'.
In the light of these tragedies there is an ever increasing need for volunteers to take part in animal conservation work.

It was in response to these killings that the political leader of the South African region, which is home to most of the country’s rhino announced a plan to mobilise the army.
‘The cruelty and brutality against the rhino, a symbol of our ecology and rich heritage, has gone too far,’ North West premier Thandi Modise said.
Ms Modise did not explain how the military would be used but previously mooted plans have included using soldiers with night vision goggles patrol the game parks after dark as well as having machine gun toting helicopters in the skies.
Proponents of the extreme measure point out that the poaching syndicates are themselves well-armed, well-funded and well organized.

Many poaching gangs themselves fly into the game parks by helicopter at night. They then use night vision equipment to either shoot the rhino at near point blank range or to tranquilize it before hacking it to death with machetes.

Rhino horn is made of keratin, a tough protein found in human fingernails. There is absolutely no medical evidence to support beliefs that the horn is useful for improving ill-health.

While there are no reliable statistics to back it up, it is thought that the number of rhino killed in recent years may have been surpassed by hunters during southern Africa’s colonial era when, at one point, there were only around 3,000 rhino left alive. There are many wildlife conservation programmes now looking for volunteers to help in this important work – read more.