Webcam viewer aids Scottish wildlife park with birth of baby rhino

February 5, 2010 by Shawn Douglas
Filed under: News

A webcam viewer in Cyprus alerted staff at a Scottish wildlife park that their white rhino was about to give birth.

Last December, a southern white rhino named Dot was set to give birth at the Blair Drummond Safari Park, near Stirling, Scotland. Excited, the staff set up a webcam to record the birthing process, which normally takes place in the early morning.

Around midday on December 21, after a 16-month gestation, Dot’s water broke. Staff were unaware of the event until an anonymous caller notified them.

Head keeper Chris Lucas told the BBC: “Just before 12 p.m. we got a call from our chief warden David Booth who said someone in Cyprus had been watching the webcam and had seen Dot’s waters break. It took us all by surprise — it’s totally the wrong time of day for rhinos to give birth.”

The tip allowed staff to get to Dot’s enclosure in time to witness the birth. “We don’t know who this woman was, but we are grateful to her. The webcam was like an extra pair of eyes,” park manager Gary Gilmour told the L.A. Times.

Dot gave birth to baby Ailsa, weighing in at 110 pounds and is already at 330 pounds after five weeks. Due to an unusually cold winter, the rhinos have been kept in a heated enclosure. While Ailsa is allowed to run around with its parents, it’s being kept separate from the rest of the southern white rhino herd for the next couple of months.

Baby Ailsa was one of eight southern white rhinos born in captivity in Europe last year. The species is endangered with a rough estimate of 17,500 of them left worldwide.