Rhinos! Another animal from the Big Five is the rhinos! We were lucky enough to see both white and black rhinos in Nairobi National Reserve. So, what's the difference?White rhinos are lighter in color, but not actually "white" - we learned that they have a square jaw and were originally called "weit" meaning wide! White rhinos are actually extinct in the wild, so the few pairs we saw on our drive through NNP are very closely monitored. They are hunted for their horns (similar to elephant tusks), and they are easy targets because they live in herds and aren't very aggressive. You can learn more at... https://www.worldwildlife.org/species/white-rhino
As we viewed the rhinos, we were reminded of symbiotic relationships - oxpeckers like to eat the bugs off rhinos and other large animals. The big mammals let them hang around because they serve as an alert system for approaching predators - it's a win-win relationship! We also spotted larger white birds hanging out around the white rhino pairs - they stay nearby because as the rhinos (and other large animals) move around, they churn up the dirt and the birds have a smorgasbord of insects to dine on!
Our guide was determined to find some black rhinos in the park, so he drove very deep in the park and we were rewarded with a spotting of a mom and baby rhino. It turns out black rhinos are very hard to find as they live and feed in the bush - we found the first pair peeking around a bush and Jason enjoyed getting a closer look through his binoculars. He was surprised by fire hose force of spray from the adult rhino - turns out the black rhino was marking its territory!
Black rhinos are solitary and territorial - we saw a few pairs because they were mom and baby duos! The have a different shaped face than the white rhino, and as mentioned above, they do not graze out in the open grass, but eat leaves from bushes and trees - making them harder to hunt and spot. You can learn more at https://www.worldwildlife.org/species/black-rhino
We ended up seeing 7 black rhino total on this drive - all pretty far from the road - but that's good because we didn't have any black rhino spottings on our future game drives in Masai Mara National Park (and white rhinos only live in controlled areas right now).
PS - a group or pair of rhinos is called a crash! (more photos coming soon)
- Log in to post comments