Marina, Madrid zoo's white rhino, has been artificially inseminated by a team of local vets and experts from Stuttgart.

This is the first time this has been achieved at a Spanish zoo, and one of very few successful procedures of this type ever performed anywhere in the world.

The normal gestation period for a white rhino, which is the world's second largest land mammal after the elephant, is between 15-16 months, which means the calf is not expected until before March 2009.