1900
500,000
individuals
A continent of rhino.
An estimated five hundred thousand black and white rhinoceros range across sub-Saharan Africa. The species are abundant, widespread, and largely undocumented.
A timeline · 1900 → 2080
One hundred andeighty years of rhino.
Scroll forward through the long arc of the African rhino — from the abundance of 1900, through the collapse of the twentieth century, to the archive we are building for a generation we will not meet.
↓ begin · 1900
1900
500,000
individuals
1970
65,000
remaining
1970
65,000
remaining
The collapse begins.
Industrial-scale poaching, fueled by a global trade in horn, halves the African black rhino population in a decade. The southern white is rebuilding from a 19th-century near-miss.
1995
2,475
black rhino · global
1995
2,475
black rhino · global
Two thousand four hundred.
The black rhino reaches its lowest recorded count: 2,475 animals. The genetic bottleneck this represents will shape conservation for the next century.
2016
01
lab · brits, NW
2016
01
lab · brits, NW
Rhino Repro is founded.
A small team of South African veterinarians and reproductive biologists establishes Rhino Repro as a non-profit dedicated to assisted reproduction in the white and black rhino.
2017
01
oocyte recovered
2017
01
oocyte recovered
The first oocyte.
The first successful ovum pick-up performed on a sedated rhino in South Africa. A single oocyte — small in number, foundational in protocol. Every subsequent retrieval builds on it.
2018
−1
northern white males
2018
−1
northern white males
Sudan.
Sudan, the last male northern white rhino, dies in Kenya at the age of 45. The subspecies now survives in two animals — both female, both in Ol Pejeta. Assisted reproduction is the only path back.
2020
23
oocytes · single session
2020
23
oocytes · single session
A record-breaking session.
Twenty-three oocytes recovered in a single retrieval — the highest yield in our history. Validates the protocol at scale and meaningfully expands the genetic material entering the archive.
2024
2024
The archive grows.
By the close of the year, Rhino Repro's biobank holds genetic material from dozens of individual animals across multiple partner reserves. Vitrification at −196°C is now routine.
2027
Q3
projected
2027
Q3
projected
First archived-derived calf.
A blastocyst cultured from biobanked material is transferred to a surrogate cow. If the pregnancy proceeds, it will be the first rhino in history born from a fully archived genome.
2050
100%
lineages banked
2050
100%
lineages banked
A genetic floor.
Our long-range goal: a permanent archive of every distinct living lineage across both species — sufficient breadth that no future bottleneck can render either rhino genetically unrecoverable.
2080
2080
For the generation we will not meet.
If the work continues, a child born this year inherits a continent whose rhino are still here — living wild, supplemented by a permanent biological archive that outlasts any single lifetime.
The line continues.
· whether it has rhino on it depends on what we do this decade ·
EXTINCTION
Featured campaign
Fragments — a species in typography.
Read by what is missing. An essay on extinction, the alphabet of loss, and the smaller word the same letters can spell.
Read the campaign →
From the field
Latest dispatches.
Story·May 2026
What it means to bank a species
Why an archive is the underwriter of every other conservation effort — and what minus one ninety-six degrees actually buys you.
Story·May 2026
The First Oocyte
A single egg, recovered in a single afternoon in 2017 — and the protocol that made everything since possible.
Story·May 2026
2016: Why we started Rhino Repro
A note on origin — why a small group of South African veterinarians and reproductive biologists decided, in 2016, to build a biobank.
With thanks to
