Jane Healy, Auckland Zoo
What better way to celebrate World Rhino Day today than with news of an upcoming rhino birth!
All going well, the Zoo’s Southern white rhino crash is set to grow, with female Jamila due to give birth sometime in November. Jamila’s pregnancy follows a recommendation from Australasia’s Zoo Aquarium Association (ZAA) species management programme for rhinoceros - for her to breed again with male rhino Zambezi and contribute valuable genetics to this programme.
Already an exceptional mother to female offspring Nyah (4) and Amali (2), Jamila is now 14 months into her 16-month pregnancy (confirmed via faecal analysis testing). Since last November, she has gained well over 100kg and is now tipping the scales at a healthy 1880kg.
Our Ungulates keeper Jess says Jamila is in great condition and that her weight gain is excellent and on par with how it tracked during her previous two pregnancies.
“A significant amount of this weight is her growing baby. At birth, Nyah and Amali both weighed around 60kg, so we’re expecting Jamila’s third offspring to be of similar size,” says Jess.
As far as predicting a birth date, Jess says Jamila’s gestations for Nyah and Amali have been 501 and 503 days respectively so are an indication, but it could depend on the sex.
“Male rhino calves actually have longer gestations than females, around 10 days longer, so time will tell!”
The management and care of Jamila has not needed to change significantly, but Jess and the team are continuing to weigh and monitor her regularly. In the final weeks leading up to her labour/birth, this will also extend to Jess and other team members monitoring her via remote cameras from home in the evening. Jamila’s ‘birthing suite’ will be a warm inside area that will have a thick bed of mulch topped with wood shavings, making it nice and soft.
“For a short period each day, Amali is having some dedicated time just with her older sister Nyah to enable her to gradually get used to a little less Jamila attention, who will naturally be very focused on nurturing her newborn come November,” explains Jess.
At four years of age and now matured to the stage where she is cycling, Nyah no longer hangs out with dad Zambezi – but visitors will also see her out in the Africa Safari Track with Jamila. In time, as part of the regional breeding and advocacy programme for rhino, as a valuable female, Nyah will be relocated to another accredited zoo within Australasia.
Southern white rhino (classified as ‘Near Threatened’/IUCN Red List) are something of a conservation success story having recovered from near extinction in the early 1900s. However, today their population is in decline – primarily due to illegal poaching for their horns (for ‘medicinal’ and craft purposes), as well as habitat loss and political unrest.
“Physically and behaviourally, rhino – our planet’s second largest land mammal - are such unique and fascinating animals. As a keystone species, they contribute so much to the ecosystems in which they live – from wallowing in the mud to create watering holes, to spreading nutrients via their dung to benefit so many other species, so we need to help ensure their future.
“As ungulate keepers, we love that our visitors can experience rhino here at the Zoo. In recent years, with the births of Nyah and Amali, there’s been incredible opportunities to follow their growth and development and watch them play and interact with each other and Jamila and Zambezi. All going well with this next birth, there’ll soon be even more to experience,” says Jess.
When you visit Auckland Zoo, you also join us in contributing to the conservation of species like rhino in the wild through our key conservation partnerships – so thank you!
In previous years Auckland Zoo has supported the Zimbabwe-based Lowveld Rhino Trust’s conservation efforts for both black and white rhino species.
Since 2019 the Zoo has been a strategic partner of the Sumatran Rhino Survival Alliance, who are taking a ground-breaking approach to helping save Indonesia’s Critically Endangered Sumatran rhino (of which there are few than 80 individuals in the wild).
Other ways to help rhino
