State-of-the-art Facility Is Dedicated to
Conservation of White Rhinos
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| © San Diego Zoo Safari Park |
Generous donors who helped to build a
state-of-the-art animal facility at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park attended a
reception in their honor May 18, as the Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center was
officially opened. A ceremonial ribbon-cutting took place, with San Diego Zoo
Global President and CEO Douglas G. Myers inviting the center’s namesake,
benefactor and longtime animal advocate Nikita Kahn, to cut the ribbon. The new
3.5-acre facility is dedicated to the conservation of white rhinos, with a
focus on assisted reproductive techniques.
“This is a
very exciting day for us, to have the Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center opened,”
stated Stacey Johnson, director of collections, San Diego Zoo Global. “The
Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center gives us the capability and power to accelerate
our understanding of the reproductive physiology of the white rhino. Working
with the animals in this facility, our researchers can learn the biology of the
rhinos and continue to develop reproductive techniques to save the northern
white rhino, and other rhino species, from extinction.”
Led by San Diego Zoo Global and Dvur Kralove Zoo in
the Czech Republic, researchers at the San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation
Research Frozen Zoo®—in cooperation with the Leibniz Institute for
Zoo and Wildlife Research (IZW) in Berlin, The Scripps Research Institute
(TSRI), and many other scientific institutions and zoos, as well as partners in
Africa—are working to develop and perfect assisted reproductive technologies to
save the critically endangered northern white rhino. Only three of these
animals remain in the world.
The Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center was built to
house the rhinos that are part of this critical work. In November 2015, six
female southern white rhinos, ranging from 4 to 7 years of age, were relocated
to the new center from private reserves in South Africa. These animals could
potentially serve as surrogate mothers for a baby northern white rhino.
To reach the ultimate goal of successfully
producing a northern white rhino, multiple steps must be accomplished. One of
the first steps involves sequencing the genomes of the northern white rhino to
clarify the extent of genetic divergence from its closest relative, the
southern white rhino.
With a grant from the Seaver Institute, Oliver
Ryder, Ph.D, director of genetics at San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation
Research, and his team of researchers have completed a whole genome sequencing
of northern and southern white rhinos, in an effort to characterize genetic
diversity. DNA samples from the six southern white rhino females that reside at
the Rescue Center have been obtained and will be added to the study.
“Sequencing the genomes of the northern and
southern white rhinos gives us information we could not obtain any other way,”
stated Ryder. “We want to know about the genetic diversity of the rhino, which
is important for their longtime survival. We want to use this information as
part of our effort to rescue the species, which will involve our understanding
the activity of genes involved in reproduction.”
“Our initial findings show the genetic diversity of
northern white rhino samples in the Frozen Zoo® appear to be
comparable to, and perhaps greater than, that of the southern white rhino
samples,” stated Tate Tunstall, Ph.D., a postdoctoral scientist working on the
project.
The next step in successfully producing a northern
white rhino requires conversion of cells preserved from 12 individual northern
white rhinos in the Frozen Zoo® to stem cells that could develop
into sperm and eggs—a process successfully begun in the laboratory of Jeanne
Loring, Ph.D., of The Scripps Research Institute, with details of the process
published in 2011.
Reproductive options might include artificial
insemination, in vitro fertilization or embryo transfer, with the southern
white rhinos serving as surrogates. There are many challenges ahead, but
researchers are optimistic that a northern white rhino calf could be born from
these processes within 10 to 15 years. This work also may be applied to other
rhino species, including critically endangered Sumatran and Javan rhinos.
The Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center is located on
the former site of the Park’s 2-acre black rhino exhibit, visible from the
Africa Tram Safari. The facility includes three large outdoor yards, two
outdoor interior yards, one outdoor maternity yard, a temperature-controlled
maternity barn, a training chute with a recessed scale to monitor individual
weights, a training chute to facilitate reproductive efforts, bedroom stalls
and a research center with necessary scientific tools. While the Nikita Kahn
Rhino Rescue Center barn’s emphasis is on neonatal care, it also can be used to
help geriatric animals and keep them comfortable in their advanced years.
Three keepers are dedicated to the care of the
animals at the Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center. For the past six months, the
keepers have been working with the rhinos, building rapport and ensuring that
they are comfortable in their environment. The animals are being trained,
through positive reinforcement, to receive any needed medical procedures.
San Diego Zoo Global has been working for decades,
along with other accredited zoos, to keep a sustainable population of rhinos
safe under human care while working to protect them in sanctuaries in the wild.
The Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center furthers this commitment and helps in
establishing the Safari Park as a sanctuary to protect rhinos—at a time when an
average of three rhinos are killed each day in the wild by poachers.
Poaching of all rhino species has reached
critically high numbers in recent years. Rhinos are poached for their horns,
which are made of keratin, the same material as human fingernails. At the
current rate of poaching, rhinos could become extinct in 15 years. The northern
white rhino is the most critically endangered. With the Nov. 22, 2015 death of
Nola, a beloved 41-year-old female northern white rhino that resided at the San
Diego Safari Park for 26 years, only three northern white rhinos remain. These
three rhinos—one male and two females, all with reproductive issues—reside in
the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya.
On any given day, visitors to the Safari Park may
be able to see one or more of the southern white rhinos from the Africa Tram
Safari, as their keepers continue training sessions and rotate them from the
back area to the front Rhino Rescue Center exhibit yard.
Nick Mertens
23 mei 2016
