Folly Farm rhino's ultrasound scan on video

Six-year-old eastern black rhino, Dakima, is due to give birth to her first calf next month at Folly Farm.

And like every mum, she needed a pregnancy scan – so her keepers enlisted vet Graham Fowke of Cotts Equine from Robeston Wathen.

This was – understandably – the first ultrasound that Graham had performed on a rhino.

He said: “The anatomy of a rhino is similar enough to a horse so I was confident we’d be able to do it.

Graham dressed in a Folly Farm uniform so he would smell familiar to Dakima as he carried out the scane.

He added: “She’d been well-trained to stand still – they’d even practiced putting gel on her stomach to get her used to the feeling and smell.

“Similar to humans, we can never be 100 per cent sure what we can see on the screen.

“Were pretty sure the images show the baby’s limbs and Dakima’s womb – as long as we can detect movement and a strong heartbeat, we know they are both doing well.”

There are now just weeks to go before the birth in Folly Farm’s £500,000 Kifaru Reserve which Dakima shares with the father of the calf, eight-year-old Nkosi.

And ahead of the event, the keepers have been busy baby-proofing the enclosure, including installing extra heaters, and installing CCTV to keep an eye on Dakima and hopefully capture the birth on camera.

Said Folly Farm’s zoo curator, Tim Morphew: “Dakima’s pregnancy seems to be going particularly well.

“She’s a healthy weight, and we can see the baby moving around in her stomach, which is pretty cool.

“Lots of babies are born at Folly Farm every year, but this time the stakes are particularly high, so this is definitely the most stressful pregnancy we’ve had.

“Our best-case scenario is that she gives birth quietly on her own with no intervention, like she would do in the wild.”

There are thought to be fewer than 650 eastern black rhinos left in the wild and just 88 in zoos across Europe, and Folly Farm is part of a breeding programme to help increase the numbers the species.