A to Z Challenge N is for Northern White Rhino

 N is for Northern White Rhino

Northern white rhinoceros

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Northern white rhinoceros
Angalifu, a male northern white rhinoceros at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park. Angalifu died of natural causes at the age of 44 on 14 December 2014.[1]
Conservation status
Critically endangered, possibly extinct in the wild (IUCN 3.1)[2]
Endangered (ESA)[3]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Perissodactyla
Family:	Rhinocerotidae
Genus:	Ceratotherium
Species:	C. simum
Subspecies:	C. s. cottoni
Trinomial name
Ceratotherium simum cottoni (Lydekker, 1908)
Orange = Northern white rhino range, Green = Southern white rhino range

The northern white rhinoceros (Ceratotherium simum cottoni), or northern square-lipped rhinoceros, is one of two subspecies of the white rhinoceros (the other being the southern white rhinoceros). Formerly found in several countries in East and Central Africa south of the Sahara, this subspecies is a grazer in grasslands and savanna woodlands. Since 19 March 2018, there are only two known rhinos of this subspecies left, called Najin and Fatu,^[4] both of which are female; barring the existence of unknown or misclassified male northern white rhinos elsewhere in Africa, this makes the subspecies functionally extinct. The two female rhinos belong to the Dvůr Králové Zoo in the Czech Republic but live in the Ol Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya and are protected round-the-clock by armed guards.

According to the latest International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) assessment from 2020, the subspecies is considered "Critically Endangered (Possibly Extinct in the Wild)."^[2]