Our first evening at Lewa, we met up with Mawingo around dusk on a game drive. She is a 15 year old, partially blind black rhino that resides on the sanctuary. Being partially blind, we were able to get much closer to her than we would have normally. We just had to make sure that we stayed down-wind. The first thing I noticed about her, were some large open lacerations that spanned vertically across the right side of her body. Getting large abrasions as a result of moving about the rugged terrain, is apparently not uncommon for rhinos, but the oxpeckers certainly didn't seem to help the healing, as they picked at her open wounds.

Mawingo has birthed five calves on Lewa. Unfortunately, due to her poor eyesight, she cannot care for them as she has a tendency to lose them when they wander off. Omni, her second born, was pulled and hand raised by staff at Lewa and now resides on his own ten acre area at Il' Ngwesi. Calves one and three were lost due to predation before they could be pulled by Lewa team members. Tula was calf number four. The latest rhino baby, Max was born on October 10, 2005.

--Jolene zooguru@cox.net