Sumatran Rhino News.

I don't know at this stage if Suci will remain in USA. My guess is that Cincinnati will want to keep her as a 2nd breeding female if at all possible- the only real option is for her eventually to go to Way Kambas in Sumatra, and meet up with her brother again.... So my guess is she will stay at Cincinnati.

They say that this newest male calf after its weaned may go to Los Angeles, like Andalas did.
 
Writhedhornbill said:
Why do they always go to LA? Do they have something special about their zoo?
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Emi lived at L.A for about four years. I think she was sent to Cincinnati as a last resort as they had the only male left. So although all animals are owned by Indoneasia, L.A zoo probably had some loan arrangement with Cincinnati which has resulted in them being able to 'borrow' her offspring. I'd doubt you will see Suci going there though...
 
There are some excellent photos of the new Sumatran rhino calf at Cincinnati on their website. He's been called 'Harrapan' At birth he weighed 86 pounds and now already weighs 147 pounds. You can see visibly how quickly he is growing too. He was the heaviest at birth of her three calves, each was heavier than the previous one...
 
Sumatran rhino mystery.

I've wondered why when the Sumatran Rhinos were at Port Lympne in the Uk they seemed to thrive and stay healthy without any problem. The answer seems to be that they were supplied with a wide range of tropical fruits as well as browse etc. They seemed to have little problem adapting to their new surroundings- even if no breeding occured.

Yet in America the imported animals lost condition and one by one they died. The story goes that Ipuh at Cincinnati was only 24 hours from death when they flew in the Ficus browse which saved his life.

Isn't it surprising if no-one in USA contacted Port Lympne about what they were feeding their animals?
 
Grant your quite right, they were supplied with heaps of different types of tropical fruits as I did get to see inside the cold room in which it was stored which was in one corner of the Rhino house, the head keeper told me they flew in fresh fruit in every flew days for them. In regard to the rhinos they had there the first female which was not a young animal had a leg injury from a poachers snare and maybe not a good choice to start a breeding program, but I think it was more of a matter of just taking what they could get.
 
MARK said:
Grant your quite right, they were supplied with heaps of different types of tropical fruits as I did get to see inside the cold room in which it was stored which was in one corner of the Rhino house, the head keeper told me they flew in fresh fruit in every flew days for them. In regard to the rhinos they had there the first female which was not a young animal had a leg injury from a poachers snare and maybe not a good choice to start a breeding program, but I think it was more of a matter of just taking what they could get.
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I read they soaked the rhino's hay in pineapple juice at Port Lympne- does anyone know if that's true?
 
Yes that is true as told to me by the head keeper at the time, i was a bit surprised to hear that, but it is true.
 
^Chris^ said:
I read they soaked the rhino's hay in pineapple juice at Port Lympne- does anyone know if that's true?
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Yep, I heard that too. I think the zoos were surprised the Sumatran rhinos wouldn't take readily to a hay diet but these were adult animals which had never seen hay in their lives before! Also being deep forest dwellers they probably wouldn't eat grass in the wild anyway so hay was a very unnatural substance to them.

I have to say Howletts and Port Lympne provide the best animal diets just about anyway- no expense is spared- the Gorillas have a huge 'menu' choice which puts a lot of other zoos to shame.

Re Breeding- I believe that neither female sent to them was suitable for breeding so they were probably doomed to failure from the start. Yet unlike the USA zoos, they had no problem keeping their (3) animals fit and healthy from the start.
 
Chester does give their animals brilliant diets. They were shipping fresh papyayas over for the hornbills.

I have seen them feeding the Gorillas at th Aspinall parks and I can see where you're coming from.
 
They were feeding brilliant diets to the Howletts gorillas back as long ago as the 1960-1970's, when most other zoos fed a basic diet of 'greengrocer' fruit and vegetables.

I've never seen anywhere else where they feed the Gorillas from the rooftops either. Howletts is the ony place where I have ever heard Gorillas 'whine' in anticipation of being fed- its rare to hear it in captivity apparently. They go 'mmmmmmmmmmm' sliding up and down the scale. A keeper told me that the ones that do it are usually related to each other and its passed on in the family.
 
I digressed as this thread is actually entitled 'Sumatran Rhino News.' The interesting thing is there hasn't been much lately. The last thing seemed to be discussions about how best to conserve the even rarer Bornean subspecies- possibly by bringing more animals into a single protected area to enable more breeding encounters to take place.

Anyone have a better update?
 
I've recieved word that Andalas is getting more and more interested in Rosa. He's been seeing her through the fences and has been very active, bending trees, urinating, etc.

Also, Rosa seems to be maturing and getting a more regular cycle. I think they'll start trying to put them together shortly.
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Found at Rhino Resource Center: Home on their msg board.
 
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