Background :: Michael Hearn

Mike Hearn 1972-2005

Mike died on 19 January 2005 while surfing off the coast at Swakopmund in Namibia, where he worked and studied.

Mike was 10 years old when he fell in love with black rhinos. An unremarkable school career left him well short of gaining entry to university. However, his determination saw him raise the money to become unpaid office boy for Save the Rhino Trust in Namibia. He later graduated to another unpaid position monitoring a unique population of desert-adapted black rhinos in north-west Namibia. When the explorer, Benedict Allen, left some camels to the rhino monitoring team, Mike’s destiny was complete as his grandfather had been in the Camel Corps.  He was admitted to Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology for a Postgraduate Diploma in Conservation Biology in 1998. Mike progressed well through his coursework and was soon upgraded to an MSc. His dissertation on density-dependence in black rhinos gained him his Master’s with Merit. He also won the Maurice Swingland Prize for the best DICE postgraduate student of his year in recognition of his progression and all-round contribution.

Following his MSc, Mike returned to the desert as Director of Research for SRT, to continue monitoring his beloved rhinos. In 2002, DICE was awarded a grant from the Darwin Initiative for the Survival of Species to expand the research in Kunene to include possible impacts of tourists upon rhinos, and how rhino conservation could be reconciled with people-centred approaches to conservation. Mike’s expertise in this area was also recognised in 2002 by his gaining membership of the African Rhino Specialist Group.

Mike’s late entrance to the academic world was tragically offset by his early death. He was an inspiration to many and his spirit lives on in the deserts of the Kunene.

*text adapted from the DICE website