What Should I Name My New Baby Rhino?
CHICAGO (WLS) – Lincoln Park Zoo is expecting! The zoo announced Thursday their critically endangered Eastern Black Rhinoceros is pregnant. The 13-year-old female named Kapuki is expected to give birth to her new calf in May.
Eastern black rhinos are a critically endangered species due to poaching for their horns which are believed to have medicinal benefits despite being made of keratin, the same material that makes up human hair and nails, according to Zoo officials.
Since the Lincoln Park Zoo is primarily donation based, they have prepared a “wish list” of Kapuki’s favorite things such as apples and hay as her diet increases throughout the pregnancy and nursing. Park officials are also asking for help purchasing a rhino-sized scale to monitor the calf as it grows.
To keep up with Kapuki’s pregnancy, Lincoln Park Zoo said they will post regular updates on social media channels using #RhinoWatch.
Finally some good news from the Zoo people and it’s about time. Seems like whenever they pop up it’s to remind us that we’re all terrible people as if they’re not the ones forcibly imprisoning untold numbers of wild animals but I digress. Turns out people aren’t so terrible when you need to raise money to care for this:
Personally I see this as a rallying cry to strengthen the public relationship between people and zoos. It’s time to stop jumping into jaguar enclosures and fat shaming sea otters and commercializing instinctual competition. There’s a baby rhino coming and we need to be prepared as a people to welcome this gigantic fucking beast with open arms.
Naturally some of you don’t care because preserving endangered Eastern Black Rhinoceros just isn’t your thing. That’s fine. But smart people like me see this as an opportunity to own an exotic piece of wildlife because technically this Rhino belongs to us. Like last year I got my first dog and in two months I’m getting my first Rhino. The attention I get from people is about to go up 1,000%. Like yeah your dog is cute but did you see that baby rhino locked in a cage on the northwest side of Lincoln Park Zoo? That’s Frank and he belongs to me (us).
#RhinoWatch