Jax Bittner, 9, and his sister Jade, 6, both of Buda, enjoy a backstage visit with a rhinoceros earlier this month at the Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glen Rose. Jax raises money and awareness for the endangered species. (Courtesy Photo)
by WES FERGUSON
Jax Bittner, a 9 1/2-year-old boy from Buda, is infatuated with a certain odd-toed ungulate – the bulky, horn-nosed, thick-skinned creature called the rhinoceros.
Jax’s passion for rhinos began with a case of mistaken identity. When he was six years old, Jax brought home a book from his elementary school library. He thought the book was about dinosaurs, but instead, it was about rhinos.
In the the book’s final chapter, he read that rhinos are being killed by humans for their horns, even though the massive mammals are critically in danger of becoming extinct.
“Why are they doing this?” Jax asked his mom, Jackie.
He started crying. Then he grabbed a crayon and wrote: “Dear rhino keepers, what can I do to help?”
Jackie was shocked by her son’s reaction. “Oh my gosh,” she thought, “we’ve got to do something.”
Jackie and her husband, Rob, did more than indulge their son’s budding interest. In the past three years they have helped Jax channel his passion into a major conservation effort. He has raised thousands of dollars to help the International Rhino Foundation and the Fossil Rim Wildlife Center in Glen Rose; adopted a Sumatran rhino that is one of only 200 in existence; and has shared the story of the rhinos with just about everyone he meets.
“A boy in my class used to hate rhinos, but I told him all about them, and he actually started loving them,” said Jax, who will be entering the fourth grade this fall at Elm Grove Elementary School.
Jax is known to the wider world as “Rhino Jax.” He has a website, www.rhino-jax.com, and a plan to start a club called the Rhino Rangers. Earlier this month, he was honored as a “young conservation hero” during a Fourth of July parade in Granbury.
One afternoon last week, Jax’s kid sister, Jade, was wearing a T-shirt that said “Help my brother save the rhinos.” Jax, meanwhile, was rattling off facts about the plant-eating mammals. Rhino horns, for example, are made from the same material as human fingernails.
“Their main protection is trampling people or charging them with their horns,” he said.
“People, though?” his mom asked.
“No,” Jax replied. “They’re mostly protecting their babies from lions and tigers.”
The biggest threat to rhinos, however, isn’t presented by lions and tigers. It comes from humans. Hunters kill rhinos for their horns, which are sold on the black market and used to make traditional medicine and dagger handles.
Rhino conservation is the family’s first and only cause, according to Jax’s mom, although Jade, 6, is passionate about dogs, cats, giraffes and cheetahs. She wants to be a veterinarian someday. When Jax grows up, he wants to become a zookeeper and own his own zoo.
“It’s going to be one of the best zoos in the world,” he said.
Rhinos in crisis
Though rhinoceros have roamed the earth for more than 50 million years, they are under threat, and all but one species is on the verge of extinction. Best current population estimates are:
White rhino: 18,000
Black rhino: 4,240
Indian rhino: 2,850
Sumatran rhino: 200
Javan rhino: 40-50
Source: International Rhino Foundation
