Subscribe free to our newsletters via your
. Space Travel News .




FLORA AND FAUNA
Poachers target rhinos in flood-hit NE India
by Staff Writers
Guwahati, India (AFP) Sept 26, 2012


Suspected poachers Wednesday killed a one-horned rhino in a flood-hit wildlife park, taking to 14 the number of the beasts slaughtered this year in the remote Indian region, officials said.

A wildlife official said poachers also shot and wounded a second one-horned rhino in Assam's Kaziranga National Park, 220 kilometres (136 miles) from Guwahati, the northeastern state's largest city.

"It is sad that poachers hacked off the horn and a portion of the right ear of the rhino that is still alive and battling for life," park warden Dibyadhar Gogoi told journalists.

The carcass of a second rhino was found floating in the floodwaters with its horn sheared off, others said.

"Poachers seem to have taken away the horn," an official who did not want to be named said.

Raging floodwaters have submerged the 430-square-kilometre park in eastern Assam, home to the world's largest concentration of one-horned rhinos.

A 2012 census in the park put the number of the creatures at 2,290, of a global population of 3,300.

The species declined to near extinction in the early 1990s and is currently listed as "vulnerable" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Kaziranga has fought a sustained battle against rhino poachers who kill the animals for their horns, which fetch huge prices in some Asian countries where they are deemed to have aphrodisiac qualities.

Floods have also swamped 19 of Assam's 27 districts, including 2,600 villages, according to official figures. Some 400,000 hectares (988,400 acres) of crops were affected and 55 breaches of river banks had been recorded.

Some two million people have also been displaced by the current floods in Assam.

.


Related Links
Darwin Today At TerraDaily.com






Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.

Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle








FLORA AND FAUNA
DR Congo conflict puts endangered mountain gorillas in peril
Kinshasa (AFP) Sept 24, 2012
Home to the famed mountain gorillas, Africa's oldest national park in the Democratic Republic of Congo has been overrun by armed groups who have slaughtered wildlife and scared off much-needed tourists. For Belgian park director Emmanuel de Merode and his staff it is a time of great uncertainty and anxiety. Last month, they were forced to spend an entire day sheltering in a cellar while ... read more


FLORA AND FAUNA
California Governor Signs the Spaceflight Liability and Immunity Act

Processing is underway with the next Automated Transfer Vehicle to be orbited by Arianespace

Fueling underway with the Galileo satellites for next Soyuz launch from French Guiana

SpaceX, NASA Target Oct. 7 Launch For Resupply Mission To Space Station

FLORA AND FAUNA
Why Curiosity Matters

Robotic Arm Tools Get to Work

NASA Mars Rover Targets Unusual Rock Enroute to First Destination

Curiosity's Stars and Stripes

FLORA AND FAUNA
China has no timetable for manned moon landing

Senior scientist discusses China's lunar orbiter challenges

NASA sees 'gateway' for space missions

Protection for Moon, Mars astronauts eyed

FLORA AND FAUNA
The Kuiper Belt at 20: Paradigm Changes in Our Knowledge of the Solar System

e2v To Supply Large CMOS Imaging Sensors For Imaging Kuiper Belt Objects

Fly New Horizons through the Kuiper Belt

Hubble Discovers a Fifth Moon Orbiting Pluto

FLORA AND FAUNA
Meteors Might Add Methane to Exoplanet Atmospheres

Two 'hot Jupiters' found in star cluster: NASA

Planets Can Form in the Galactic Center

Birth of a planet

FLORA AND FAUNA
NASA Selects Space Launch System Advanced Development Proposals

Space formula of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky

XCOR Announces FiberDyne as Lynx Mark I Wing Strake Manufacturer

NASA's Space Launch System Celebrates a Year of Powering Forward

FLORA AND FAUNA
China Spacesat gets 18-million-USD gov't support

Tiangong Orbit Change Signals Likely Date for Shenzhou 10

China Focus: Timeline for China's space research revealed

China eyes next lunar landing as US scales back

FLORA AND FAUNA
Dawn Sees Hydrated Minerals on Giant Asteroid

Vesta in Dawn's Rear View Mirror

Dawn has Departed the Giant Asteroid Vesta

US space probe leaves asteroid's orbit, NASA says




The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2014 - Space Media Network. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement,agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement