An Animal tank?
A belief widely held, even as recently as the last century, was that a rhinoceros was bullet-proof. Actually the skin isn't as tough as it looks. Scratches will draw blood, and a knife can penetrate the thick skin easily. Depending on the species, a rhinoceros will have one or two nasal horns. The horns are not attached to its skull and are composed of hairlike fibers matted together. Its imposing size and appearance could lead one to judge the rhinoceros to be a rather sedate animal, when actually it can be quick and agile. Some have been clocked running 40 kilometers per hour or faster. Generally the rhino is described as gregarious and mild-mannered; however the black rhinoceros is said to be of uncertain temperament and will charge when threatened. For the most part, though, a rhino would rather flee than fight.Is he Blind or What?
Like the white rhino, the black rhino has two horns, and lives in Africa. Unlike the white rhino, it has a reputation for being anti-social and quick to anger. Some scientists think that's because the black rhino is very nearsighted. At a distance of only 15 feet, it can't tell a man from a tree. So it charges at anything, just to be on the safe side. Black rhinos have been known to charge at trees and large rocks!The once numerous rhinoceros family, Rhinocerotidae, in the order Perissodactyla, now contains only five living species. All are threatened with extinction, some imminently. Rhinoceroses are large mammals with large heads, small eyes, one or two horns on the snout, and three toes on each foot. All but the Sumatran rhino are virtually hairless except for the tip of the tail and a fringe on the ears. The Sumatran rhino is covered with a fairly dense coat of hair and is related to the extinct long-coated woolly rhino, Coelodonta antiquitatis, of Ice-Age Europe. The Indian and Javan rhinos are one-horned; the other three species are two-horned.
The rhino's horn is composed of keratin, as is the cow's horn, but unlike the cow's horn it is of a fused, fibrous construction and solid throughout, with no hollow for a core of bone. The fibers represent greatly modified hairs. The horn is attached to the skin and is supported by a raised, roughened area on the skull. Because many Asians, particularly the Chinese, believe the rhino horn has aphrodisiacal properties, the horns are widely sought after, and this demand accounts for much of the illegal killing of rhinos.
The three species of Asiatic rhinos include the Indian rhino, Rhinoceros unicornis, and the nearly extinct Javan rhino, R. sondaicus; the former, native to northeastern India, is now found in only a few protected areas; the Javan rhino, once distributed across southeastern Asia into the East Indies, now survives only in a small preserve at the tip of the island of Java. The Sumatran rhino, Dicerorhinus sumatrensis, is now confined to a few widely scattered areas in southeastern Asia and in the East Indies. The two species of African rhinos are the black rhino, Diceros bicornis, and the white rhino, Ceratotherium simum. The latter is believed to have received its name from a mistranslation of the Afrikaans word for "wide," referring to its lips, rather than to its color, which varies from brown to gray. The living rhinoceroses range from 2 to 4.2 m (6.5 to 14 ft) long, from 1 to 2 m (40 to 80 in) high at the shoulders, and from 1 to more than 3 tons in weight. Extinct rhinoceroses include the largest land mammals that ever lived. Baluchitherium, which lived in Asia during the Oligocene and early Miocene (from about 37 million to 25 million years ago), reached 7 m (23 ft) in length--including a 1.2-m (4-ft) head--and 5.4 m (18 ft) in height at the shoulders.
Edwin E. Rosenblum
Bibliography: Davis, J. G., Operation Rhino (1972); Guggisberg, C. A., Rhino (1967); Penny, M., Rhinos (1988); United Nations, Elephants and Rhinos in Africa: A Time for Decision (1982).
