Rhinos
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Tamba, a male from the Knoxville Zoo, and Jasiri, a male from the Jacksonville Zoo, came to the Detroit Zoo in 2005.
After a long truck journey, Tamba and Jasiri backed cautiously out of their 6,000-pound custom shipping containers and began exploring their new home in the former elephant habitat. The area was renovated after elephants Winky and Wanda moved to a California sanctuary. For the rhinos’ safety and comfort, the moat embankment was given a gentler slope, the pool depth was reduced from 7 to 5 feet, and the mud wallows area was expanded.
The Zoo hopes to acquire females eventually for breeding.
For more than 50 million years, rhinos roamed the world; at one time, there were more than 100 species. But since 1970, poaching and habitat loss have reduced global rhino population by 90 percent. Only five species exist today: white, black, Indian, Sumatran and Javan. All are in danger of extinction.
Cooperative programs like the Rhino Species Survival Plan (SSP), which coordinates management of rhinos for the American Zoo and Aquarium Association, ensure that zoos’ efforts contribute to wild rhino conservation. The Rhino SSP helped the Detroit Zoo secure its two new rhinos after Zoo officials expressed a commitment to rhino conservation and a desire to bring rhinos back to Detroit.
For the record, the white rhinoceros is not white, it’s gray. The name derives from the Dutch "weit," meaning wide, a reference to its wide square muzzle perfectly adapted for grazing. Tamba and Jasiri appear nearly identical to the Zoo’s last resident rhino, Rudy, a black rhinoceros. Like all black rhinos, Rudy was gray, too. Go figure. Black rhinos probably earned the name because they appear black after wallowing in the mud – a favorite rhino pastime.
Whatever the color, the Zoo’s rhino residents are fascinating representatives of the rhino family’s intriguing heritage and history on our planet. The Detroit Zoo looks forward to playing a part in preserving this species as we continue our mission of "Celebrating and Saving Wildlife."
Rhino photo archive
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