The Black Rhino is also known as the Hook-Lipped Rhino in reference to the elongated point at which its top lip ends. The western black rhino in Africa has been declared extinct by the latest assessment of threatened species. Location: black rhino occur throughout southern and eastern Africa, including Kenya, Tanzania, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe; Habitat: black rhino can occur in a range of habitats where there are sufficient resources to support them. Between 1960 and 1995, black rhino numbers dropped by a sobering 98%, to less than 2,500. This is designed to help it to pull the foliage off of bushes, trees and shrubs. A black dehorned rhinoceros is followed by a calf on August 3, 2012 at the Bona Bona Game Reserve, southeast of Johannesburg, South Africa. Poaching vulnerability. The photograph shown above was appended to … The black rhino is one of the two rhino species found in Africa. Thanks to persistent conservation efforts across Africa, black rhino numbers have doubled from their historic low 20 years ago to between 5,042 and 5,455 today. Established in 1964, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species has evolved to become the world’s most comprehensive information source on the global conservation status of animal, fungi and plant species. As well as declaring the western black rhino (Diceros bicornis longipes) extinct, it records the northern white rhino (Ceratotherium simum cottoni), a subspecies in … Its skin is more of a grey colour. The black rhino once roamed most of sub-Saharan Africa, but today is on the verge of extinction due to poaching fueled by commercial demand for its horn. Since then, the species has made a tremendous comeback from the brink of extinction. In the same way that the white rhino is not white, the black rhino is not actually black. In April 2015, users of social media sites lamented news that the western black rhino had been officially declared extinct.