OFFICIAL: Last Western Black rhino snuffs it

The last of the Western Black rhino (Diceros bicornis longipes), a rare species of black rhino, has died and the survival of the northern white configuration hangs in the balance, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The revelation was made as part of the IUCN's Red List, which it claims is a …

[Anonymous Coward]

Futurama reference.....

So the harvesting of human horn begins when the rhino horn runs out??

[Marvin the Martian]

Ogden Nash reference, too...

The rhino is a homely beast,

For human eyes he's not a feast.

Farwell, farewell, you old rhinoceros,

I'll stare at something less prepoceros.

[Just Thinking]

If there was only one left

The species was effectively extinct already surely?

(This is going to be one of those comments that about 50 people make before the first one gets moderated, isn't it?)

[James Micallef]

cloning?

[Thomas 4]

At least we got this cool looking ivory jewellery out of it

Fucking assholes.

[csmac3144]

Wrong species

Rhino no have ivory, chief.

[Ammaross Danan]

Powdered

In case you missed it, it is usually traded in powdered form as an aphrodesiac. Once again, sex sells.

[fishman]

Przewalski's horses

Przewalski's horses were extinct in the wild, but there were 31 of them in captivity. Nine were used in a breeding program to reintroduce them to the wild.

[Andus McCoatover]

surely..

the other 22 must've been jealous!

[Mike Brown]

survival of the fitest? we won, therefore the earth is ours to do with as we please. if the rhino's had wanted to surive they should have evolved thumbs, and invented fire. lazy rhinos

[Andus McCoatover]

"Powdered rhinoceros horn can sell for up to $20 a gram"

'Suppose it's cheaper than Viagra. Or, was.

Douglas Adams' book "Last chance to see" is an essential read.

[JaylikeBird]

Powdered rhino horn is cheaper than cocaine!?! What is wrong with people?

[Pyros]

Hey, the last line gave me an idea...

Why don't they, uh, "buy" the horn at a higher price, with the "stipulation" that they want to "harvest" the horn themselves right off a live animal at a time of their own choosing?

Ergo, you're buying the animal out from under them while they think it's a great steal from "the silly white people?"

[Anonymous Coward]

Im curious about something, obviously we probably had a large part of the demise of this animal, so credit due there, but should we really be getting involved with saving every different type of animal out there.

I mean, lets say some all powerful being saved the dinosaws, that could have buggered up everything for us.

What i mean is, do we have the right to stop nature doing its thing?

I just think that nature has managed for millions of years, crossing off one species an off shoots of others thrive, i think in many cases of humans sticking there fingers in to natures business we end up making things worse.

Its like the rabbit an the fox, not very many rabbits, foxes starve an die, less foxes, rabbits grow in numbers, more rabbits more foxes, the cycle continues, if we try to save all the rabbits what happens to the foxes, now thats very simplified an a poor example but thats kind of what i mean

BUT point taken, if we killed them all off thats a fair reason to try keep them alive, although if you go back 10000 years would the same still be true....

[Anonymous Coward]

yes, but if on one hand you say that an animal being poached to extinction by humans is nature doing it's thing, then surely anti-poaching measures put in by other humans is also nature doing it's thing.

[Gorbachov]

We are killing off species left and right and despite many people trying very hard to save some species, almost always, the efforts fail. Reading the wiki about the current extinction event is thoroughly depressing. The current efforts to stem the tide are another case of 'too little, too late' that seems to be the result of a standard human approach whenever we confront a global problem.

What do you mean do we have the right?! We are the primary cause of this extinction event! And that is not even taking into account global warming, in case you don't believe in it. We have reduced the variety of plants and animals on this planet so much that it's literally mind-boggling. It will take millenia for the planet to regenerate.

[Flashy Red]

It's time ...

We are one of the few species Nature gifted with the ability and desire to kill it's own. Isn't it time we put this particular quirk to good use by allowing and actively encouraging the hunting and killing of poachers. Perhaps even capturing, trying them and then, upon conviction, releasing them into a game reserve where they can be legally dispatched by either trained hunting teams or captive species they've helped bring to the edge of extinction? People like to hunt, so why not hunt the selfish, worthless bastards who reduce our world's bio-diversity.

[Suburban Inmate]

I saw this coming.

Not cos I'm a smartarse but because it was reported on a documentry featuring White Rhinos (Last Chance To See with Stephen Fry) that since none of the Black Rhinos had been spotted for a while, the preparations were under way to have it declared oficially extinct.

Alien: "WTF? That virus with shoes is pretty damn nasty! Tell the Whitehouse where to stick their dinner invitation..."

[Johan Bastiaansen]

Powdered rhino horn

When this stuff is found by customs, it should be enriched by a pinch of arsenic and let through. When the rich and stupid start to keel over, blame Darwin.

[Flashy Red]

I was going to suggest it, too.

Might help the Chinese with their over-population issues.

[a_been]

This is what happens when fuckers ignore reality!

How many farm animal species are going extinct? Answer none. A 5 kilo horn is worth $100,000 retail but $0 wholesale in the countries where the black rhino lived, in fact it's in the interest of the locals to see the rhino dead so they can use the land. Animal conservationists didn't do their best to keep the Black Rhino alive, they did everything they could to make sure it would go extinct.

You can't own or farm the rhino, you can't kill it, you cant use the land it's on and while we know your poor you can bloody well pay taxes to protect it while your children die of malaria! and now it's extinct. An animal worth up to $100,000 dead is now dead, who couldn't see that happening. If they conservationists had really given a damn they would have gone and asked a farmer "why don't you kill all your animals now? Surly you would make more money this year". Hopefully they would have been hit by a very large stick with "clue" carved into it.

[James Micallef]

Farm animals are farm animals because their ancestors were open to being domesticated. You can be sure that if rhinos, African elephants etc could be domesticated, they would have been domesticated thousands of years ago.

[Anonymous Coward]

ah, humans

the true scum of the universe.

[Eeep !]

Not wrong there - but you didn't mention the stupidity

What I don't get is why a species with such a valuable crop as some are willing to pay for isn't being farmed ? Seriously - if that horn was worth so much then what are the poachers going to tell their children ? It certainly will not be about how they planned for the future. Hopefully it will speed the demise of the stupidity gene.

Seeing the majesty of a real live rhino simply eating (not cute, not furry, and not singing Bohemian Rhapsody) but requiring an armed guard was when I finally realized that my own species deserves the extinction it will most surely being upon itself - most probably it's hoping for a comet or something or other cataclysm just to avoid the blame.

[Frederic Bloggs]

Farming

Actually one could "farm" rhinos, at least to the extent that one does not need to kill the animal to get its horn and, crucially, it will grow back in time. At $100,000 a chuck, even darting rhinos and waiting 4 or 5 years for another go must be viable - assuming it were in everyone's interests to avoid killing it.

[Chuckl]

The only relevance to anything is the 'OFFICIAL' bit. They haven't seen any since 2006. Non-news about sub-species.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Black_Rhinoceros

[Anonymous Coward]

@a_been

You ask how many farm animals have gone extinct. Actually loads. The current crop of farm animals are ones that have been genetically engineered (via breeding rather than genetically modified) to get the best out of them leaving all the ones who didn't make it extinct.

[JeevesMkII]

Seems like spammers could do the world a service

We need to get the idiots who buy this the internet right away. Then spammers can inform them there's a much better way to get their dick hard, and it costs way less than 20 bucks a gram.

[Nater]

Powdered Rhino horn for $20 a gram? Do people snort it? I'm just asking.

[Filippo]

Set up DNA banks

I think we should set up a fund to preserve the DNA of every endangered species, so they might be cloned at some future point in case all preservation efforts fail. Storing the sequence in digital form would probably be sufficient, and getting a full genome is relatively cheap nowadays. It wouldn't be very costly.

[Anonymous Coward]

Obi Wan misquoted?

What he actually said was:

Mos Eisley spaceport: You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy with the possible exception of Earth.

[Charles 9]

There is a concern.

The concern is that wiping out all these species starts dulling the world's genetic diversity, and any evolutionary will attest, diversity is good for the biosphere, since it makes it hardier against disease and other threats. Furthermore, obscure species may hold genetic secrets that could prove extremely useful...if they're still around when we discover them.

[MJI]

Poach the poachers

Valuable kidneys and livers in there

[Stoneshop]

Their brain

not so much

[darklord]

A Sad Day

It cant be got back if this is true.

When will we learn to protect these endangered species properly.

The poachers should be shot on sight..

[Pascal Monett]

“Human beings are stewards of the earth"

Yep, and they're doing their job perfectly well - for a drunk, cocaine-addled junkie, that is.

[Anonymous Coward]

Lots of species

came and went before humans, lots will come and go afterwards.

As a WWF poster ad stated with a picture of a gorilla and some tribesmen "try telling him this isnt food for his starving family" I'm still of the opinion that we should let natural famine and pestilence take it's course, since we haven't had a good war to cull the populations in a few decades, hence global starvation and unemployment due to overpopulation. The same with the fox and rabbit thing is also true of humans, yet we pump more money into feeding "humans" in countries that are never going to support the population size than we do into saving species that have every right to exist alongside or even to eat the humans.

what a mixed up world.

bet the "feed the poor dictatorial peoples" will downvote me, but my mind about predator and prey animals wont change till I see a vegan lion or tiger, happily munching on a tofu gazelle.

Let some die so others survive, only let humans lead the same fate, that way it would equalise the odds for all species