Ceratotherium simum
The largest of the 5 existing rhinoceros species, it inhabits bushy grasslands and savannahs with low grass with the presence of southern African water.
Diurnal and territorial, it exclusively eats grass spending about 12 hours a day eating. The male adult leads a solitary life while the females, that are more social, can form small groups with the calves and the younger animals. After a courtship that lasts up to 20 days, and a gestation of 16 months, a single calf is born weighing about 40 kg and it’s already able to stand up after just 2 hours.
It’s not uncommon to observe them while taking mud baths, useful not only to create a protective barrier against parasites but above all to regulate their body temperature.
The greatest threat is represented by poaching for the illegal trade of the precious horn with which, among other things, medicines with alleged aphrodisiac and curative properties are made.
WHO IS HERE AT THE BIOPARCO?
Thomas and Kibo are two males born in 2016 coming from the Burger Zoo (Holland) and from the Hapsburg Zoo. Thomas predominates between the two but they are both of a quiet nature and they get on very well together: you can often observe them playing or bathing in mud and then rubbing themselves against the logs.
Nutrition
They eat about 15 kg of food a day including natural meadow hay, fresh grass, wheat, oats, apples, carrots as well as two different types of pellets, one of which contains 50 different types of herbs from the Bavarian Alps with high nutritional value.
