He probably hasn’t dated in two decades, but the survival of a species may depend on whether Tam can get lucky soon.
A male rhinoceros recently rescued on the edge of Borneo’s rain forest is expected to become the first participant of a Malaysian breeding program for his critically endangered ilk, a wildlife expert said yesterday.
The roughly 20-year-old Borneo Sumatran rhino, nicknamed “Tam,” was found wandering in an oil palm plantation in August with an infected leg likely caused by a poacher trap.
Tam, whose species is known for its solitary nature, has been resettled in a wildlife reserve in Malaysia’s Sabah State, the last preserve of the Borneo Sumatran rhino — a subspecies of the bristly, snub-nosed Sumatran rhino.
Authorities hope to bring at least five male and female rhinos into the reserve over the next few years so that they can mate and produce offspring, said Junaidi Payne, the senior technical adviser for the World Wildlife Fund’s (WWF) Malaysian Borneo chapter.
“Their numbers are so low that they might drift into extinction if no one does anything,” Payne said?Experts could not confirm how many Borneo Sumatran rhinos remain in the wild, but estimates range from 10 to 30 individuals, many of them isolated from others in their species.
Borneo Sumatran rhinos have rapidly vanished in recent decades as their habitat has been lost to logging, plantations and other development. Poachers have hunted them for their horns, which are used in traditional medicines.
The rhinos in Sabah’s 120,000 hectare reserve will probably be able to find each other through their scent and mate without human interference, Payne said.
“If they are not stressed out by people, the chances of success should be better,” he said.
Hope for the subspecies was boosted after Malaysian government officials and WWF specialists found new evidence of them in the wild in May 2005. Rhino protection units have since launched patrols to deter poaching.
Conservationists have warned the rhinos could face extinction in the next 10 years.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS