Dusty

9.5 x 6.25 inches
Watercolor and Ink on 140lb cold press paper

When I was in Zimbabwe in 1996, I saw nearly all of the five "big game" animals: lions, elephants, cape buffalo, leopards....but no rhinoceroses.  It would seem that these creatures were (and are) on a dramatic decline in number, and are therefore exceedingly rare in the wild.

There's at least one Diceros bicornis at the Denver Zoo, of the black/hook-lipped variety, and I'm happy to report he looked well-fed and feisty when we visited a couple of days ago.  He frolicked about in his enclosure, seemingly not perturbed by the dust and mind-numbing wind that's so common to our area. Yet I couldn't help but wonder if, during this time of year, he wished he were a woolly rhinoceros...