We found some very useful information at RhinosInfo.com. Did you know that black rhinos are considered “browsers” and have a hooked upper lip which helps them to pull leaves from the twigs and branches? Black rhinos dine on trees, shrubs, and tasty herbs they pull out by hooking their upper lip around the plant and tugging. During the rainy season, when the plants are especially juicy, the black rhino might eat an entire plant—branches, twigs, leaves, and all! The black rhino is known to eat more than 200 different kinds of plants—but no meat—and unlike their white rhino cousins, they don’t eat much grass at all.

In celebration of Thanksgiving, we’ve put together a word search for you to print out and share with your friends. Can you find the names of the plants and shrubs that Chizi might eat?

If you’d like to learn more about saving black rhinos, check out Chizi’s Tale: The True Story of an Orphaned Black Rhino It’s available at your favorite retailer on land or online. All proceeds will be donated to Tusk USA.

Feel free to share Chizi with the Trick or Treaters in your neighborhood. To print, simply click on the image. Let’s do what we can to save our rhinos!

Greenwich’s Jack Jones poses with the family, the Wenham’s, who inspired his book “Chizi’s Tale.”

We are delighted to share this wonderful piece from GreenwichTime.com featuring Jack Jones on the importance of saving black rhinos from extinction and the need for continued education.

An excerpt from the article “Rallying for rhinos: Young author pens tale of survival and hope”

As Jack Jones worked to bring his first book from concept to creation, it was the impending destruction of a species a world away that kept him on task.

“Back in 1970, there were about 65,000 black rhinos in Africa, and today there are fewer than 5,000,” said Jones, during a recent interview.

Like the world’s four other species of rhinoceros, black rhinos are under intense pressure to survive, considering the high demand in some world markets for their horns, which are thought to carry medicinal powers. The rate of poaching in recent years has ratcheted up the alarm. In South Africa, government officials estimated that more than 1,000 rhinos were poached last year, up from about 600 in 2012. “They could be extinct in our lifetime, if we don’t address the problem of poaching,” said Jones, 17, a lifelong Greenwich resident who is a senior at Brunswick School. “That is why I decided to really focus on this book as a means of addressing that problem.”

Last spring, Jones set out (with help from illustrator Jacqui Taylor) to share the true story of Chizi, a baby black rhino who lost his way one day in August 2013 on the plains of the Malilangwe Reserve in Zimbabwe. Jones hoped others would be as inspired as he was by the Wenham family, who took the animal into their home and hearts. The end result is Chizi’s Tale (Keras, $16.99), which was released last month.  (READ MORE.)

Chizi’s Tale Fun Pack Activity Kit

Calling all parents, teachers and counselors—we’re on a mission to help save the black rhino and we hope you’ll join us!

Chizi’s Tale: The True Story of an Orphaned Black Rhino, written by high schooler Jack Jones and illustrated by Jacqui Taylor, tells the story of two park rangers in Zimbabwe who found an abandoned baby black rhino. They called the local park manager who, knowing the baby rhino would not survive alone, took him home and named him Chizi. Chizi still lives with the park manager and his family and when he’s mature enough, he will be released back into the wild.

Black rhinos are critically endangered. Saving Chizi and helping him return to his natural habitat is vital to helping his species survive.  Author Jack Jones has partnered with Tusk USA and is donating 100% of the proceeds from the sale of Chizi’s Tale to Tusk USA to help save black rhinos. But if conservation efforts are to succeed, it is imperative that education be promoted at an early age. To that end, we’ve put together a very special Chizi’s Tale Fun Pack Activity Kit—and invite you to share Chizi’s Tale whenever—and wherever—you can. Click here to download your Fun Pack today!

A small selection of the dozens of photos that were taken on this joyous occasion!

[Photo credits to Ann Billingsley Photo]

CHIZI’S TALE FUN PACK