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Tag: rhinoceros

  • “Operation Crash” Takes Down Black Rhino Horn Salesmen

    A federal grand jury in Los Vegas today issued indictments for two men accused of selling black rhinoceros horns in the U.S. The men were caught in a sting that was part of “Operation Crash,” a nationwide investigation into the rhino horn trade led by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Servie and the Justice Department.

    Edward N. Levine and Lumsden W. Quan, both residents of California, have each been charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the Endangered Species Act and one count of violating the Lacey Act, the 1900 law that created criminal penalties for the sale of illegal plants and wildlife in the U.S.

    Levine and Quan are alleged to have sold two black rhino horns via email and telephone conversations. The buyer was an undercover law enforcement agent who negotiated the sale of the horns for $55,000. The sale took place in a Las Vegas hotel room on March 18, 2004 and the men were arrested later that day.

    The black rhinoceros, once widely seen throughout Africa, is now one of the most endangered species of rhinoceros. According to the International Rhino Foundation the African population of black rhinos was only 4,240 as of 2008. The Justice Department estimates that black rhino populations have decline by more that 90% since 1970, much of it due to the rhino horn trade. The trade of black rhino horn is regulated by the 1976 Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora treaty.

    This indictment is yet another wildlife-related case that the Justice Department has taken on during 2014.

    In January a Queens, New York fish importer was convicted of smuggling nearly 40,000 piranhas into the U.S. and selling them to fish retailers for around $37,000.

    In February a New Jersey man was convicted of smuggling 33 narwhal tusks worth an estimated $2.5 million from Canada. The man faces up to 20 years in prison and a possible fine of up to $250,000.

    Image via Yathin S Krishnappa/Wikimedia Commons

  • Sumatran Rhino ‘Suci’ Dies at Zoo

    A rare female Sumatran rhinoceros called Suci died at the Cincinnati Zoo Sunday, putting a big damper on the breeding program that had been implemented to help save the critically endangered species. Suci was one of ten Sumatran rhinos in captivity worldwide, and the only female in Cincinnati.

    The rhino had been showing symptoms indicative of the same disease that killed her mother, though zoo officials won’t be sure until necropsy results come in, which might take months.

    Sumatran rhinos are very critically endangered, with only six populations existing in the wild – four in Sumatra, one in Borneo and one in the Malay Peninsula. They’re difficult to count, because they’re a solitary species and are scattered across a wide range, but their numbers are estimated to be less than 275. The decline of the Sumatran rhinoceros is due primarily to poaching for their horns, which go for up to $30,000 a kilo on the black market. The horns are greatly valued in Chinese traditional medicine.

    Here’s a clip featuring Suci:

    The zoo had attempted to inbreed Suci with a sibling, younger brother Harapan, who is now the only Sumatran rhino in North America, after a summit in Singapore deemed that as few as 100 Sumatran rhinoceroses comprise the Indonesian and Malaysian populations. Andalas, the other male born at the zoo, was sent to Sumatra in 2007 to jump start a breeding program there, and has produced a male calf with a wild-born mother.

    Here’s some footage of Harapan:

    Zoo staff had been waiting on Harapan to reach sexual maturity, but a few months ago Suci developed hemochromatosis, also known as iron storage disease. The female rhino was initially responding to therapy, and regaining weight, though her condition began to deteriorate rapidly on Sunday.

    Terri Roth, director of the Lindner Center for Conservation & Research of Endangered Wildlife said in a statement Monday, “Suci was a symbol of hope for her entire species, one that is quickly losing ground in the wild, and her absence will leave a hole in our hearts.” The Cincinnati Zoo has yet to form a new plan to reestablish the breeding program, but remains committed to saving the species.

    Roth added, “If we don’t act quickly and boldly, the loss of this magnificent animal will be among the great tragedies of our time.”

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • South African Abalone Poaching Kingpin Sentenced

    A South African court sentenced a regional abalone poaching kingpin to two years in prison on Friday, after he pleaded guilty to smuggling 3,243 of the gastropod mollusks, which are a pricey delicacy in parts of Asia.

    Peter Jansen of Cape Town appeared alongside 20 other defendants, who faced a collective 530 charges, including racketeering, corruption and illegal possession of abalone, comprising the largest abalone poaching takedown in South African history. Chinese national Ran Wei, the alleged mastermind behind the whole operation, fled from South Africa, but was still charged in absentia.

    Abalone, also called venus’s-ears in South Africa, is a common name for any of a group of small to huge edible sea snails of the family Haliotidae. Other common names are perlemoen, ear shells, sea ears, muttonfish, muttonshells, ormer and pāua, depending on what part of the world one might be poaching them from.

    Abalones have been identified as being threatened with extinction, due to overfishing and acidification of oceans from anthropogenic carbon dioxide. Some predict that abalone will become extinct in the wild within 200 years at present rates of carbon dioxide production, as the reduced seawater pH erodes their shells.

    World Wide Fund’s marine program manager Eleanor Yeld Hutchings called the abalone industry an extreme instance of a fishery with high levels of illegal, unregulated and unreported catch. The illegal harvest in South Africa in 2008 was roughly 860 tons, more than 10 times the legal TAC (total allowable catch) of 85 tons. It’s believed that comparable totals have been caught since.

    Yeld Hutchings commented, “If poaching continues at its current level, and the TAC remains stable for the legal commercial catch, abalone could reach commercial extinction by 2030.”

    Jansen admitted to hiring the car that moved the 3,243 shucked abalone, worth roughly $30,200, to Johannesburg for transport. His guilty plea statement explained, “The seized abalone was clearly not for own consumption but for commercial purposes of exporting and selling.”

    Biodiverse South Africa, home to most of the rhinoceri on that continent, is also having a poaching problem on that front. Some say that the present rate of horn harvesting could render the species extinct in the wild within a decade. Rhino horns, which are highly valued in Chinese traditional medicine, can go for up to $30,000 a kilo on the black market.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons.