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WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — A “completely ridiculous idea” hatched by animal behaviorists at the Palm Beach Zoo & Conservation Society has successfully saved the eyesight of an endangered white rhino in Zimbabwe, officials said Monday.
The unlikely treatment plan, implemented in August 2025, involved coaxing the rhino, named Thuza, into a confined space to allow for the application of medicated eye drops. Thuza was suffering from a life-threatening parasitic eye infection that threatened to blind him, potentially jeopardizing a crucial conservation program.
Daniel Terblanche, a security manager with Imvelo Safari Lodges, where Thuza resides, expressed initial skepticism. “Believe me, we didn’t think of it; it was a completely ridiculous idea to us,” Terblanche said, according to the Associated Press. “But without trying all of the things that we could to rectify that situation, we would have been in trouble, I think.”
The conservation effort centers around reintroducing southern white rhinos to communal lands outside Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park, a project spearheaded by the Community Rhino Conservation Initiative with support from Imvelo Safari Lodges. According to Mark Butcher, managing director of Imvelo Safari Lodges, Thuza’s condition posed a significant threat to the program’s future. “This rhino had bleeding eyes. He was rubbing his eyes,” Butcher said. “And I was looking at a potential where this guy was gonna lose his eyesight. And this is in a pilot project that’s got fantastic vision for a future for conservation throughout Africa.”
Palm Beach Zoo CEO and President Margo McKnight initiated the collaboration after learning of Thuza’s plight during a visit to the area last year. She contacted Thad and Angi Lacinak, founders of Precision Behavior, specialists in animal training techniques. The Lacaniks developed a plan based on methods used at the Palm Beach Zoo, where animals are trained to voluntarily participate in their own healthcare.
“With this few animals in this location in Africa, it was essential that we save all of them,” Angi Lacinak said. “So when they called and said, Thuza is going to lose his eye, a blind rhino is a dead rhino. So no matter what it took, we were going to proceed over there and try.”
The process involved gradually acclimating Thuza to the confined space using his favorite foods, followed by desensitizing him to human touch and the sensation of water being sprayed on his face. Within two weeks, the team successfully transferred the skill set to Terblanche and other anti-poacher scouts, enabling them to administer the eye drops daily.
“Within about a week, we were actually putting the eye drops strategically in his eyes while he held for it,” Lacinak said. “And by the end of two weeks, we had transferred that skill set to not only Daniel, who was in charge of leading their guards, but to the guards.”
Southern white rhinos are currently listed as near threatened, with approximately 16,000 individuals remaining in the wild. Poaching and habitat loss continue to pose significant threats to the species’ survival. While Thuza and other rhinos continue to face these challenges, the successful treatment of his eye infection offers a hopeful sign for the future of the conservation program.
“They’re consistently getting the medications into his eyes every day,” Lacinak said. “And the rhinos are just thriving now and they feel really, really confident that this solved their problem.”
