VN May 2022

Vetnuus | May 2022 6 In 2020 alone, poachers killed over 500 rhinos across South Africa – roughly one every 22 hours. And while this is an improvement on recent years, it is far too many for the highly threatened population to sustain. There are other risks too. Many of the techniques used to protect the remaining animals, including dehorning and translocation, depend on chemical immobilisation (anaesthesia) using drugs that pose a risk to the animals with effects that are not perfectly understood. In collaboration with Dr Peter Buss and SANPark’s Veterinary Wildlife Services, Professor Leith Meyer and his team have been working for several years to change this. Leith teaches wildlife pharmacology and medicine in the Faculty of Veterinary Science at the University of Pretoria and is spearheading research related to wildlife capture and chemical immobilisation. One of his primary research focuses is to improve the safety of rhinos during veterinary procedures in the field. Rhinos are particularly sensitive to anaesthesia. They can suffer from severe cardiorespiratory perturbations, with respiratory rates dropping from 19 breaths per minute to as low as 3 or 4 breaths per minute, and heart rates can exceed 150 beats per minute. “When you look at the data of their physiology, these animals are sitting on a knife’s edge. We must improve how we do things during rhino anaesthesia.” On top of this, Leith is focused on finding solutions that work out in the field where vets conduct procedures with limited resources. “Using oxygen from a big cylinder is very effective in rhinos but is not always practical, especially when working from a helicopter. When darting a rhino from a helicopter and you need to dehorn it or treat it, you want to make sure the animal has the best physiological response to the drugs used – you don’t have any fancy equipment to revive the animal.” Keeping anaesthetised rhinos safe Developing safer capture and immobilisation techniques for one of the world's most endangered animals