{"id":2322855,"date":"2026-03-11T11:01:17","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T11:01:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2322855"},"modified":"2026-03-11T11:01:17","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T11:01:17","slug":"first-southern-white-rhino-calf-of-2026-born-at-the-wilds-safari-park","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/first-southern-white-rhino-calf-of-2026-born-at-the-wilds-safari-park\/","title":{"rendered":"First southern white rhino calf of 2026 born at The Wilds safari park"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<div id=\"videoWrap\" class=\"spacer-large videoWrap\" style=\"position:relative\"><media-video video-id=\"86246306007\" title=\"The Wilds, Ohio's home for safaris, aids in wildlife conservation\" poster=\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/authoring\/authoring-images\/2025\/08\/20\/NCOD\/85735114007-the-wilds-ac-020.JPG?crop=4499,2531,x0,y300\" util-module-path=\"elements\/media\" placement=\"snow-video-story-priority\"><\/p>\n<div id=\"uwVideoPlaceholder\" slot=\"placeholder\" style=\"z-index:19;width:100%;padding-bottom:56.25%;position:relative\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"vidplaybtn\" style=\"display:-moz-box;display:-ms-flexbox;display:-webkit-flex;display:flex;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,.4);border:2px solid #fff;border-radius:80px;cursor:pointer;height:80px;width:80px;position:absolute;top:50%;left:50%;transform:translate(-50%,-50%);z-index:10\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"vidplayicon\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/appservices\/universal-web\/universal\/icons\/icon-play-alt-white.svg\" alt=\"play\" style=\"height:40px;margin:auto 18px auto 27px;width:40px\"\/><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div slot=\"videoDetails\" id=\"videoDetails\" class=\"videoDetails\" style=\"padding-top:8px;padding-bottom:8px\">\n<div id=\"videoDetailsContainer\" class=\"videoDetailsContainer\" hidden=\"\">\n<p>The Wilds, Ohio&#8217;s home for safaris, aids in wildlife conservation<\/p>\n<p>As seen on a Wildside safari tour, southern white rhinos are one of the main attractions bringing visitors to The Wilds in rural Cumberland, Ohio.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/media-video><\/div>\n<p>Break out the cigars \u2026 it\u2019s a 100-pound boy!<\/p>\n<partner-banner util-module-path=\"elements\/partner\" class=\"spacer-large\" min-height=\"600\" fluid=\"\" outstream=\"\" momentum=\"\"\/>\n<p>The strapping lad arrived at about 1 p.m. March 5 and is already walking. Fortunately, that\u2019s normal for a newborn <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thewilds.org\/animals\/southern-white-rhino\">southern white rhino<\/a>, the second-largest land animal in the world.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dispatch.com\/story\/lifestyle\/travel\/2025\/09\/28\/the-wilds-safari-park-blends-conservation-tourism-isoutheastern-ohio\/85667832007\/\">The Wilds<\/a>, near Cumberland, recently welcomed its first rhino calf of the year. The as-yet-unnamed neonate is said to be getting tons of TLC from mom Agnes. His sire, Bernard, also resides at The Wilds.<\/p>\n<p><media-image image-set=\"https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/authoring\/authoring-images\/2026\/03\/10\/NCOD\/89090238007-southern-white-rhino-calf-male-3386-grahm-s-jones-columbus-zoo-and-aquarium.jpg bestCrop, https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/authoring\/authoring-images\/2026\/03\/10\/NCOD\/89090238007-southern-white-rhino-calf-male-3386-grahm-s-jones-columbus-zoo-and-aquarium.jpg?crop=2879,2159,x180,y0 4:3, https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/authoring\/authoring-images\/2026\/03\/10\/NCOD\/89090238007-southern-white-rhino-calf-male-3386-grahm-s-jones-columbus-zoo-and-aquarium.jpg?crop=1620,2159,x810,y0 3:4, https:\/\/www.gannett-cdn.com\/authoring\/authoring-images\/2026\/03\/10\/NCOD\/89090238007-southern-white-rhino-calf-male-3386-grahm-s-jones-columbus-zoo-and-aquarium.jpg?crop=3239,1822,x0,y0 16:9\" image-alt=\"\" credit=\"Photo by Grahm S. Jones\/Provided by Columbus Zoo and Aquarium\" caption=\"The Wilds welcomed its first rhino calf of 2026 on March 5. The southern white rhino baby, born to Agnes and Bernard, weighed approximately 100 pounds at birth.\" orientation=\"horizontal\" class=\"spacer-large\" util-module-path=\"elements\/media\"\/><\/p>\n<p>The birth is the first of two southern white calves expected this year at The Wilds, a nonprofit safari park and one of the largest conservation centers in North America with nearly 10,000 acres of reclaimed coal mine land in Guernsey and Muskingum counties<\/p>\n<p>Officials at The Wilds say the birth underscores the success of the center\u2019s rhino breeding program, which has seen multiple generations of southern white rhinos arrive since it began in 2004.<\/p>\n<partner-banner util-module-path=\"elements\/partner\" fluid=\"\" bottom=\"\" lazy=\"\" class=\"spacer-large\" min-height=\"390\" outstream=\"\"\/>\n<p>More than 30 southern white rhinos have been born at The Wilds, which lists the animals\u2019 current conservation status as \u201cnear-threatened,\u201d as defined by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).<\/p>\n<p>Southern white rhinos nearly went extinct in the early 1900s, when fewer than 100 remained. Now they are the most populous of all rhino species, with approximately 16,800-21,000, according to the IUCN.<\/p>\n<p><media-gallery-promo asset-id=\"85735178007\" class=\"column ten-column no-gutter spacer-large\"\/><\/p>\n<p>A near-threatened species is one that may be vulnerable to endangerment in the near future but does not currently qualify for threatened status.<\/p>\n<p>While conservation efforts have boosted southern white rhino populations in recent years, threats remain, including habitat loss, poaching, and human-wildlife conflict.<\/p>\n<partner-banner util-module-path=\"elements\/partner\" fluid=\"\" bottom=\"\" lazy=\"\" class=\"spacer-large\" min-height=\"600\" outstream=\"\" momentum=\"\"\/>\n<p><em>Contact features and entertainment reporter Belinda M. Paschal at <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"mailto:bpaschal@dispatch.com\">bpaschal@dispatch.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<lit-timestamp class=\"column ten-column no-gutter spacer-small\" slot=\"timestamp\" publishdate=\"2026-03-10 23:17:36.505820281 +0000 UTC\" updatedate=\"2026-03-10 23:17:36.505820281 +0000 UTC\"\/><\/div>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.dispatch.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Wilds, Ohio&#8217;s home for safaris, aids in wildlife conservation As seen on a Wildside safari tour, southern white rhinos are one of the main attractions bringing visitors to The Wilds in rural Cumberland, Ohio. Break out the cigars \u2026 it\u2019s a 100-pound boy! The strapping lad arrived at about 1 p.m. March 5 and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2322857,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[39915,407500,407502,6297,434205,450222,361999,21739,344928,211924,239343,239453,407501,23139,239344,444750,399518],"class_list":["post-2322855","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-affiliate","tag-aquariums","tag-aquariums-u0026-preserves","tag-eamotion","tag-ecology","tag-ecology-u0026-environment","tag-environment","tag-local","tag-local-affiliate-travel","tag-neutral","tag-overall","tag-overall-neutral","tag-preserves","tag-travel","tag-u0026","tag-wildlife","tag-zoos"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/First-southern-white-rhino-calf-of-2026-born-at-The-scaled.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322855","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2322855"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322855\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2322859,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2322855\/revisions\/2322859"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2322857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2322855"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2322855"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2322855"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}