Oooh, me so horny

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Meet one of California’s most recent Indian American residents. Her name is Lali and she weighs about 180 lbs. MSNBC reports:

A “darling girl” named Lali stuck close to her mom but greeted other adults with curiosity during her first public outing this week.

The two-month-old rare Indian rhinoceros made her debut at San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park Thursday after spending her first eight weeks in a private enclosure to allow bonding time with her first-time mother, Gari.

“She immediately was exploring meeting the other Indian rhinos, but most of the time she kept close to mom,” said park spokeswoman Yadira Galindo.

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p>Zoo officials are keeping mum as to whether or not Lali’s mom has already arranged for a suitable alliance with the family of a young male rhino for when Lali comes of age. The San Diego Zoo community has long since cracked down on the practice of dowries so we thankfully won’t have to worry about Lali selling her horn to raise money.

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p>Am I the only one that didn’t know that India even had rhinos? I mean, I always hear about tigers in India (like many I’ve been on a tiger safari there), and everyone knows about the elephants, but I just can’t remember a time when I have heard about an encounter between Indian villagers and a rhino.

The Indian rhino formerly occurred from the foothills of the Hindu Kush in Pakistan, across the sub-Himalayan region, to the India-Myanmar border on the eastern edge of the Brahmaputra watershed. By the late 19th century, the Indian rhino had been eliminated from everywhere except the Chitwan Valley (Nepal), lowland Bhutan, the Teesta Valley (west Bengal, India) and the Brahmaputra Valley (Assam, India). For most of the 20th century, known populations have been concentrated in southern Nepal and northeastern India. [Link]

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p>Of course, as with most megafauna, the Indian rhino’s days appear to be numbered.

Lali, which means “darling girl” in Hindi, is one of about 2,550 Indian rhinos in the world, 150 of which are in parks and zoos. The species is considered critically endangered because of human encroachment on its native habitats in India and Nepal and because the rhinos have been poached for their horns, which some believe have medicinal value.

15 thoughts on “Oooh, me so horny”

  1. National Geographic and the Discovery Channel have done shows on Kaziranga National Park and Indian Rhinos. Park Rangers patrol on elephants in the brush, but they simply aren’t well funded enough to fight off poachers. Its situation is similar to that of the Asiatic Lion, now only found in Gir National Park in Gujarat. Loss of habitat and hunting has left only these sanctuaries for them to survive in. People focus on how India’s over population has strained the economic resources of the country, putting stress on money, energy, cleanliness, education, etc., but the devastation to its flora and fauna has always been overlooked.

    Africa gets a lot more press from conservationists than India or other Asian countries.

  2. India’s wildlife in its heydey rivalled that of Afica’s. The diversity and population of so many different species was truly impressive. National Geographic has had many articles about Indian wildlife over the years. Sadly, there has been an extinction crisis looming for decades, with very unsatisfactory results as far as conservation is concerned. Ironically, the British served to protect Indian wildlife, even though they hunted lions and tigers mercilessly – it’s mainly post-Independence India which has wiped out the animals.

  3. Africa gets a lot more press from conservationists than India or other Asian countries.

    because africa is where india was around 1900.

    for example, cheetah’s went extinct in india in the 1950s.

    as for the rhino, they are almost all in nepal from what i remember, no one wonder abhi had never thought about them.

  4. Hey, you stole my tag line 😉 As you can tell, I like rhinos, so thanks for the horns up on this Abhi. Amitabh it’s not quite so simple, I wouldn’t say the British ‘protected’ Indian wildlife, but the advance of technology such as traps and rifles has meant that poaching is on a far larger scale now. Chinese medicine drives much of the illegal hunting even in India; it is a highly lucrative trade. This market force was less active in the subcontinent during the Raj – then the main drive was rich Englishmen going on prize hunts, numerically far less animals were killed.

  10. FYI – someone I know who grew up in Assam bears the nickname ‘Assamese Rhino’ – so the Indian rhino has a bit of fame, at least. 🙂

  11. …the rhinos have been poached for their horns, which some believe have medicinal value.

    You shouldn’t have published that! Now every republican out there probably thinks it’ll help with their ED.

  13. You shouldn’t have published that! Now every republican out there probably thinks it’ll help with their ED.

    riiiiight. except YOU are the one who provided the specifics regarding “medicinal value” for those awful republicans to learn. by the way…i could be wrong and i’m sure one of the doctors/med students here will correct me immediately if i am, but democrats occasionally can’t get it up as well. i always thought “couch” issues are an utterly non-partisan issue. since i’m all about the truthiness.

  14. Kaziranga is a national park, and has more than just rhinos; but the Rhino is the state symbol of Assam. (Ironically, my brother works for Ecko in Manhattan, but that was somehow lost on him, the Rhino bit, that is.. )

  15. In the Baburnama, Babur writes of hunts to kill rhino in the thick lush forests of Punjab (back then the jungle was called “lakee” meaning a hundred thousand trees for its large and thick size).