One of the world's largest rhino conservation farms is going under the hammer in South Africa. 

After 30 years of trying to save the endangered species, the 81 year old owner, John Hume, has finally run out of money.

"I'm left with nothing except 2,000 rhinos and 8,000 hectares of land," Hume quipped in an interview ahead of the sale.

His heavily guarded farm, at an undisclosed location in North West province, has around 2,000 southern white rhinos,  a subspecies of white rhinoceros that was hunted to near extinction in the late 19th century but gradually recovered thanks to decades of protection and breeding efforts.

Today, the Red List compiled by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) categories white rhinos as "near threatened", with around 18,000 left following a decline in the last decade.

South Africa is home to the world's largest population of white rhinoceroses, and about half of the total black rhino population on the African continent is living in the country.

Poaching for their horns is the primary threat to the giant mammal. 

Hume's farm has miles of fences, cameras, heat detectors and an army of rangers patrol the site. The tight security is meant to dissuade would-be poachers from getting the message that "they don't stand a chance", said the farm's head of security, Brandon Jones. 

However, Jones pointed out that the exercise is only partially successful, as poachers will merely go and kill rhinos somewhere else. "We are simply diverting them from our reserve. We know that they will target areas where it is easier to penetrate and where the risk-reward ratio is to their advantage," he said. 

The government said 448 of the rare animals were killed across the country last year, only three fewer than in 2021 despite increased protection at national parks such as the renowned Kruger.  

As a former businessman, Hume made his fortune by developing tourist resorts. Hume said that, through the years, he had lavished around $150 million on his massive philanthropic project to save the world's second largest land mammal. Later this week, Hume will auction off his rhino farm to the highest bidder. 

(Cover image is a screenshot, with input from AFP.)

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