It’s a Rhino!

This May, Ratu a Sumatran Rhino is due to give birth to one of the world’s rarest babies at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary located within the depths Indonesia’s Way Kambas National Park. We need your help to ensure the baby’s safe delivery which will help to secure the future for this incredible but critically endangered species!

This is really special news, as it there are such a small number of Sumatran rhinos left in the world, every birth helps to save this species.

The Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary is a 250-achre complex. With less than 100 Sumatran Rhinos estimated to be left in the world, the breeding efforts of this sanctuary are critical to the future of the species. Ratu is one of six rhinos that live at the sanctuary, and we need you to help us secure the safe arrival of the seventh.

The average baby Sumatran rhino weighs up to 50kg, and will drink (and grow!) as much as 2kg every day. That’s a lot of food to supply while mum is eating for two. And then there’s the new maternity pen, medical supplies, CCTV to monitor mum and baby, two-way radios for the rhino wardens and much more.

Sumatran rhinos were recently declared extinct in the wild in Malaysia, a result of loss of their habitat and poaching. And with now less than 100 surviving in small fragmented populations in Southeast Asia – in areas that are shrinking due to human encroachment – these rhinos are having a tough time breeding. So the population is getting ever smaller. If we can help more rhinos like Ratu raise calves, we can reverse this tragic decline.

This isn’t Ratu’s first baby. She gave birth to her first calf back in June 2012 – Andatu.