The overarching goal of the AIRS project is to understand how four different health indicators – physical fitness, reproduction, well-being, and iron storage physiology — overlap and interact with each other across seasons. The data collected from the study will enhance our collective understanding of rhino biology, and will be used to inform best practice recommendations. Shared publicly, these recommendations will allow veterinarians and Wildlife Care staff that work with rhinos around the world to provide the best conditions possible for the rhinos in their care.
“This study is an example of our holistic approach to animal care” says Dr. Gabriela Mastromonaco, Senior Director of Wildlife Science, Toronto Zoo. “More and more, we are understanding how the various areas of health and well-being are interconnected. For example, nutritional husbandry can affect health status, which can have ripple effects on reproductive success and overall wellbeing. A collective and accessible database, with contributions from rhinos across North America, is exactly the kind of evolved approach that is needed to support reproductively healthy, genetically diverse rhino populations in future.
With white rhino numbers decreasing in the wild, maintaining a healthy, genetically diverse population in managed care settings is an increasingly important strategy. Doing so, while ensuring the physical and mental welfare of each animal is flourishing, is our mission. “We have a tremendous opportunity with the animals under our care at our Zoo. Not only are we safeguarding them, but we can also learn about their biology that we’d never be able to do with rhinos in the wild” explains Deserrai Buunk, Wildlife Care, Toronto Zoo. “When I started at the Zoo 15 years ago, I was sharing with guests that there were 22,000 white rhinos in the wild. Now there are fewer than 16,000. We have to work fast, we have to work together, and we have to share information to save this species.
The Zoo’s rhinos are willing participants in the AIRS study through their positive reinforcement training program. It’s a bit of a case of “who is training who?”: Wildlife Care staff provide a cue and reinforce a behavioural response with treats (like pellets, produce, or small amounts of alfalfa hay), meanwhile, from the rhino’s perspective, they have trained Wildlife Care staffs to drop those treats when they perform a specific behaviour. “These animals are amazing to work with” says Buunk. “When we do these training sessions, we’re really asking the rhinos to please participate with us, and to develop a common language that we can speak together. Each rhino is different, and our interactions have to adjust to suit the individual. The question is always ‘how can we build that trust that enables each animal to freely participate in their own care?
This project uses some of the skills the rhinos were already familiar with – like lining up against training areas, allowing their feet to be manipulated, and having their bodies touched — and modified them to assist with data collection. Several months before the start of the study, Wildlife Care staff began practicing new behaviours with the rhinos. Foot work was used as a springboard to desensitize the rhinos to wearing an anklet made from a military belt; this belt can carry an activity tracker that logs steps taken, distance travelled, and temporal variations. Some rhinos needed more time to become comfortable with certain behaviours: Zohari was initially not a fan of a measuring tape being wrapped around her belly (such measurements, coupled with the regular body weights we are able to get on our Zoo rhinos, will allow scientists to estimate the weight of a rhino when they don’t have a scale handy). Meanwhile, measuring bioimpedance (a way to determine body fat composition based on passing a very weak electrical current between electrodes) was complicated because the sticky pads wouldn’t initially stay on: it turns out our rhinos have very well moisturized skin, thanks to the shea butter Wildlife Care staffs regularly apply to their skin as a moisturizer. It took some trial and error to figure out how to clean their skin to get the pads to stick!
AIRS scientists completed the first round of data collection on your Toronto Zoo’s rhinos in February, but Wildlife Care staff continue to practice in preparation for summer data collection: you may see rhinos wearing their stylish anklets in their habitat this summer. Not only will the data collected inform best practices for the rhinos here in our care, they can also be helpful to those working in situ. The innovative, non-invasive techniques that are being developed and validated in this study would not be possible without through the voluntary participation of our rhinos. The outcome of the AIRS study will hopefully be a suite of tools that can not only help animal care staff working with zoo-housed rhinos, but can be used by those who are working to protect these amazing animals in their natural habitat.