Poaching has been defined as the illegal hunting or capturing of wild animals, usually associated with land use rights. Poaching was once performed by impoverished peasants for subsistence purposes and a supplement for meager diets. It was set against the hunting privileges of nobility and territorial rulers.
The Javan rhinoceros, also known as the Sunda rhinoceros or lesser one-horned rhinoceros, is a very rare member of the family Rhinocerotidae and one of five extant rhinoceroses. It belongs to the same genus as the Indian rhinoceros, and has similar mosaic, armour-like skin, but at 3.1–3.2 m (10–10 ft) in length and 1.4–1.7 m (4.6–5.6 ft) in height, it is smaller. Its horn is usually shorter than 25 cm (9.8 in), and is smaller than those of the other rhino species. Only adult males have horns; females lack them altogether.
The black rhinoceros or hook-lipped rhinoceros is a species of rhinoceros, native to eastern and southern Africa including Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Eswatini, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Although the rhinoceros is referred to as black, its colours vary from brown to grey.
Kaziranga National Park is a national park in the Golaghat, Karbi Anglong and Nagaon districts of the state of Assam, India. The sanctuary, which hosts two-thirds of the world's great one-horned rhinoceroses, is a World Heritage Site. According to the census held in March 2018 which was jointly conducted by the Forest Department of the Government of Assam and some recognized wildlife NGOs, the rhino population in Kaziranga National Park is 2,413. It comprises 1,641 adult rhinos ; 387 sub-adults ; and 385 calves. In 2015, the rhino population stood at 2401. Kaziranga is home to the highest density of tigers among protected areas in the world, and was declared a Tiger Reserve in 2006. The park is home to large breeding populations of elephants, wild water buffalo, and swamp deer. Kaziranga is recognized as an Important Bird Area by BirdLife International for conservation of avifaunal species. When compared with other protected areas in India, Kaziranga has achieved notable success in wildlife conservation. Located on the edge of the Eastern Himalaya biodiversity hotspot, the park combines high species diversity and visibility.
A rhinoceros, commonly abbreviated to rhino, is one of any five extant species of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae, as well as any of the numerous extinct species therein. Two of the extant species are native to Africa, and three to Southern Asia. The term "rhinoceros" is often more broadly applied to now extinct species of the superfamily Rhinocerotoidea.
The Indian rhinoceros, also called the Indian rhino, greater one-horned rhinoceros or great Indian rhinoceros, is a rhinoceros species native to the Indian subcontinent. It is listed as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, as populations are fragmented and restricted to less than 20,000 km2 (7,700 sq mi). Moreover, the extent and quality of the rhino's most important habitat, the alluvial Terai-Duar savanna and grasslands and riverine forest, is considered to be in decline due to human and livestock encroachment. As of 2008, a total of 2,575 mature individuals were estimated to live in the wild.
The white rhinoceros or square-lipped rhinoceros is the largest extant species of rhinoceros. It has a wide mouth used for grazing and is the most social of all rhino species. The white rhinoceros consists of two subspecies: the southern white rhinoceros, with an estimated 19,682–21,077 wild-living animals in the year 2015, and the much rarer northern white rhinoceros. The northern subspecies has very few remaining individuals, with only two confirmed left in 2018, both in captivity. Sudan, the world's last known male northern white rhinoceros, died in Kenya on 19 March 2018.
Chitwan National Park is the first national park in Nepal. It was established in 1973 and granted the status of a World Heritage Site in 1984. It covers an area of 952.63 km2 (367.81 sq mi) and is located in the subtropical Inner Terai lowlands of south-central Nepal in the districts of Nawalpur, Parsa, Chitwan and Makwanpur. In altitude it ranges from about 100 m (330 ft) in the river valleys to 815 m (2,674 ft) in the Churia Hills.
Zakouma National Park is a 1,158-square-mile (3,000 km2) national park in southeastern Chad, straddling the border of Guéra Region and Salamat Region. Zakouma is the nation's oldest national park, declared a national park in 1963 by presidential decree, giving it the highest form of protection available under the nation's laws. It has been managed by the nonprofit conservation organization African Parks since 2010 in partnership with Chad's government.
Garamba National Park is a nearly 2,000-square-mile (5,200 km2) national park in north-eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is among Africa's oldest parks, and has been designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. Garamba has been managed by African Parks in partnership with the Institut Congolais pour la Conservation de la Nature (ICCN), since 2005.
Bardiya National Park is a protected area in Nepal that was established in 1988 as Royal Bardia National Park. Covering an area of 968 km2 (374 sq mi) it is the largest and most undisturbed national park in Nepal's Terai, adjoining the eastern bank of the Karnali River and bisected by the Babai River in the Bardiya District. Its northern limits are demarcated by the crest of the Siwalik Hills. The Nepalgunj-Surkhet highway partly forms the southern boundary, but seriously disrupts the protected area. Natural boundaries to human settlements are formed in the west by the Geruwa, a branch of the Karnali River, and in the southeast by the Babai River.
Kaziranga National Park is an Indian national park and an UNESCO World Heritage Site situated in the Golaghat and Nagaon district of Assam, India. It is a tourist destination and conservation area particularly notable as a refuge for the endangered Indian one-horned rhinoceros, hosting the largest population of wild Indian one-horned Rhinoceros in the world. The park contains significant stock of three other large herbivores — the Asian Elephant, the Asiatic Water Buffalo and the eastern subspecies of the Swamp Deer. Kaziranga also has the highest density of tiger in the world and is declared a Tiger Reserve in 2006. Kaziranga is recognized as an Important Bird Area by Birdlife International for conservation of avifaunal species.
The International Rhino Foundation is a Texas-based charity focused on the conservation of the five species of rhinoceros: the White Rhinoceros and Black Rhinoceros in Africa; the Indian Rhinoceros, Javan Rhinoceros and Sumatran Rhinoceros in Asia.
Esmond Bradley Martin was an American conservationist who fought for both the preservation of elephants against the illegal ivory trade, and for the rhinoceros against the illegal trade of rhinoceros horns. A trained geographer, Martin was considered a world-renowned expert in the ivory trade and rhinoceros horn trade. He had been a special envoy of the United Nations for the conservation of rhinoceros. Militant for a reduction in the demand for ivory to dry up the market, he participated notably in the stop of rhinoceros horn trade to China in 1993 and ivory in 2017.
The Barandabhar forest covers an area of 87.9 km2 and bisects the Chitwan District in east and west Chitwan. Barandabhar, a 29 km long forest patch, is bisected by the Mahendra Highway, resulting in a 56.9 km2 area in the buffer zone of RCNP and 31 km2 is under the district forest office.
Rhino poaching in Assam is one of the major environmental issues in India which continues in the region of Kaziranga National Park, Manas National Park and some other grasslands of Assam. These rhinos are inhabited most of the floodplain of the Indogangetic and Brahmaputra riverine tracts and the neighboring foothills.
Hemanta Mishra is an international advisor for the Humane Society International. He is the author of the books The Soul of the Rhino and Bones of the Tiger. Over the course of his career in conservation biology, he has worked with the Smithsonian Institution, the World Wildlife Fund, the World Bank, Nepal's Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation, the Asian Development Bank, the American Himalayan Foundation, and the King Mahendra Trust for Nature Conservation. He was awarded the J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize for his work and is credited with preventing the extinction of Nepal's rhinos and tigers.
Big Life Foundation is non-profit conservation organization focused on preserving the wildlife and habitats of the Amboseli-Tsavo-Kilimanjaro ecosystem of East Africa through community-based and collaborative strategies.
Hemmersbach Rhino Force is a direct action conservation organization acting with a focus on the African rhinos. Rhino Force's main activities comprise of anti-poaching rangers in the Greater Kruger National Park, a biobank called Hemmersbach Rhino Force Cryovault to preserve rhino genes and the Black Rhino Reintroduction to bring back rhinos to the Mid Zambezi Valley in Zimbabwe.
Over 18–28 December 1911, King George V of the United Kingdom took part in a hunt in the Kingdom of Nepal as part of an expedition organised by the Prime Minister of Nepal, Chandra Shumsher Jang Bahadur Rana. The king had wanted to visit Nepal in 1905 but due to the ongoing 1899–1923 cholera pandemic, he could not enter the region. The crew killed 39 tigers, 18 rhinoceros, 4 bears, and several porcupines and leopards over the course of the 10-day expedition. During the hunt, the king knighted Chandra Shumsher with the Royal Victorian Order.
