Here lies the unborn baby rhino, just weeks away from birth, lifeless in the grass as the flies start to swarm over his tiny fragile body. He rests next to his mother, who was shot twice and then left to die slowly and agonisingly during the dark moonless night. To the right of the baby are the very horns for which he and his mothers were murdered, an unproven, illegal and non-traditional medicine used in the far East. In this case the cows will to survive helped her to evade the poachers for long enough to stop them from stealing her horns (which were taken by the police as evidence), before finally succumbing to her wounds. A day earlier this scene would have been so different; a beautiful, vibrant and healthy rhino cow grazing away in the afternoon sun, carrying inside her this young symbol of hope for the species.. Now together they lie, wasted lives decaying into the ground like so many of the world’s last rhino populations. The brutal reality is that every rhino cow who falls victim to poaching is a potential double blow for the future of the species, and unborn calves are not even recorded in official statistics. This photo was submitted as part of my photojournalism story for @nhm_wpy _______________________________________________________ #Rhino #RhinoHorn #AntiPoaching #Wildlife#Death #Nature #WildlifeCrime#Photojournalism #Death #RhinoPoaching#Poaching #SaveOurRhino
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