Channel Nine’s Amber Sherlock shares pictures from her adventure in Sumatra to help save endangered rhinos

CHANNEL Nine presenter Amber Sherlock has travelled to a Sumatran wildlife sanctuary as part of a Taronga Zoo project aimed at saving a dwindling rhinoceros population.

Channel Nine presenter Amber Sherlock at the rhino sanctuary during a recent trip to Sumatra.

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TELEVISION presenter Amber Sherlock was the star of show-and-tell at Mosman Public School last week.

It may not have been a nationwide television audience but Sherlock made her daughter Piper proud by standing up in front of Piper’s class and sharing her recent experiences with rhinoceroses in Sumatra.

Sherlock and her husband Chris live in Mosman and have two children Piper, 7, and son Zac, 3.

Amber Sherlock with daughter Piper at Balmoral beach. Picture: Brianne Makin

Questions from the children include, “What’s it like to touch a rhino?” and “Were you scared sleeping in the jungle?”.

As an ambassador to Taronga Zoo, Sherlock was invited to join a team, including zoo head Cameron Kerr, to visit the rhino sanctuary in Sumatra.

Last year, Sherlock’s ambassadorial duties were devoted to bilbys so she agrees rhinos are a much larger project.

“I felt so grateful and privileged — not many people to get up that close to a rhino,” she said.

“There is a difference between visiting the zoo and seeing the amazing work being done by the zoo behind the scenes.”

A shot of a baby rhino taken by Sherlock at the Sumatran sanctuary.

With one of the sanctuary staff.

Dinner in the wild.

Sherlock has the opportunity to get up close to rhinos in the sanctuary, including feeding a mother and baby in the veterinary clinic.

And how does the hide of a rhinoceros feel?

“Really rough and they’ve got this spiky hair — they’re quite prehistoric,” Sherlock said.

During the trip, Sherlock slept one night in the jungle and was she scared?

“I wasn’t really scared because we were escorted by rhino protection officers but there were lots of mozzies and leeches,” she said.

Sherlock hosted a fundraising yoga session at Taronga Zoo with yoga teachers Fraser Guthrie and Lyndsey Benn.

Sherlock, a Channel Nine presenter for more than ten years, said she was honoured to help get the message across about the need for animal conservation and to support the Taronga Conversation Society.

“There are only about 100 rhinos left in the wild in Sumatra,” said Sherlock

She held a yoga session at Taronga Zoo in June to raise money for the conservation society.