After visiting Kruger Park and seeing the carcasses of recently poached white rhinos, Prince Harry has released some personal footage and photos of his summer in Africa, working on conservation projects, showing the plight of endangered species in Africa.
The first of seven releases was an image of the red-haired Prince assisting vets and experts in de-horning a rhino.
“I was working with Dr. Mark Jago and Dr. Pete Morkel in Namibia. Some countries are de-horning small populations of rhino to deter poachers from shooting them.
“My initial task each time was to monitor the heart rate and oxygen levels and help stabilise them as quickly as possible. My responsibilities then grew to taking blood and tissue samples and the de-horning itself.”
One of two videos depicts Harry feeding orphaned rhinos. Little information was released about Harry’s stint in the south of Africa, but he spent time at a rhino orphanage, and assisted in the calves’ care.
“These baby rhinos are at an orphanage because their mothers were killed by poachers,” the tagline reads. “I can’t say where this is for obvious reasons. But I spent an afternoon with Petronel Nieuwoubt who runs the orphanage.
“The youngest rhino was called Don. He was just two months old when he was found in Kruger National Park. Petronel has students and volunteers from all over the world come to look after these orphans. They pay for this experience and that money is used for milk, food, fencing and rangers for security.”
Another video then came, of Harry assisting in the release of a rehabilitated rhino. The beast is blindfolded and struggles to its feet following sedation. The former army captain helps a ranger check on the animal as it comes around.
The tagline says “Trying to stop a three tonne rhino with a rope and a blindfold isn’t easy! Especially in this harsh terrain in Botswana.” Kensington Palace released the media on instagram, also providing information on the organisations that Harry helped, or supports.
“Mapp Ives and Kai Collins, with the help of Botswana Defence Force and the government, are doing everything they can to protect their newly reintroduced rhino population. This sometimes means having to sedate them to check on how they’re doing,” the video’s tag explains.
Another photo shows Harry hugging a huge African Elephant, which had been sedated. The tag shows the Prince’s passion: “How can it be that 30,000 elephants were slaughtered last year alone? None of them had names, so do we not care?And for what? Their tusks?”
He called it a ‘poinltess waste of beauty’.
Harry also put out a photo of a mother, Thandi, and her calf, Thembi. The photo shows the two lying down in the grss, and is poingant, as the mother does not have her horn – it was hacked off by poachers, yet she survived and has gone on to have a calf.
“There is no pretending that any of this will be easy. It won’t be. But when we win this battle and reverse the rise in poaching, the victory will belong first and foremost to those on the frontiers,” the Prince said earlier today.
One of the most shocking photos is Harry assisting in an operation on a black rhino, the victim of poaching. Hope, as she was named, was tranquilised by the poachers, before they cut her horn off, damaging her face badly. The second operation, in which the Prince helped, was a success, though Harry’s comment on the photo shows his pain for the animals, as well as his passion to save them.
He also praised his brother’s work in conservation, promising to support him in any way possible.
