Breeding success for Javan Rhino

29/05/2007 00:00:00 August 2006. Scientists have discovered signs that 4 Javan rhinos have been born recently in Indonesia; this can be considered as a baby boom for the rarest large mammal in the world, a species that has been reduced to less than sixty animals worldwide. These are the first recorded births of Javan rhinos for 3 years. Signs of the baby rhinos were found in Indonesia's Ujung Kulon National Park by a team of biologists, park rangers and WWF staff, working with local people while checking on the rhinos after a recent earthquake.

‘Javan rhinos are probably the rarest large mammal species in the world and they are on the very brink of extinction,’ said Arman Malolongan, the Director General of Forest Protection and Nature Conservation at Indonesia's Ministry of Forestry. ‘To discover that this population is breeding, even slowly growing,- gives us hope for the species' future.’

Javan rhinos are the rarest species of rhino in the world and are critically endangered. It is thought that only 26 - 58 Java rhinos exist in Ujung Kulon. The only other known population of Javan rhinos is in Cat Tien National Park in Vietnam, where it is thought that just 8 rhinos survive. The first sign of a calf was found a few weeks ago, when a small footprint (about 16-17 cm) with a larger footprint belonging to the mother were found. A day after this discovery, a second set of mother-and-calf footprints of a different size was found in a elsewhere. Both signs were thought to be less than 3 days old. On the same day, another team came face-to-face with yet another calf, which they identified as a female, and her mother. The following day, the team found a fourth small footprint in a different location.

‘Javan rhinos live deep inside the rain forest and it's very unusual to catch a glimpse of them,’ said Adhi Rahmat Hariyadi, Site Manager FOR WWF-Indonesia in Ujung Kulon National Park. ‘Our team was lucky to actually be able to observe a mother and calf on the regular route from north to south of Ujung Kulon Peninsula when checking A camera trap installed in the area.’

Owing to the distance between the 4 areas where the footprints were seen and their differences sizes, the team concluded that they represented evidence of 4 different calves. WWF and park staff still hope to get photos of the calves from the remote camera traps in the area.

With evidence that the Javan rhinos in Ujung Kulon are breeding, WWF has recommended that the park authorities reduce the main threats to the Javan rhino, for instance habitat and food competition with wild cattle inside the park, as well as invasive vegetation that restricts the expansion of the rhinos' favourite plants. WWF also CALLS for the establishment another population of Javan rhinos elsewhere to protect the species from disease and natural disasters that could threaten the whole population.