Janks quickly became fast friends with the history-making rhino shortly after his arrival at Carson Springs with the help of one secret weapon: watermelon. Many wildlife foundations fought to have Henry live out his retirement years at their facilities, but an exceptional reputation, a good relationship with Henry’s previous home and the ideal rhino climate allowed Carson Springs to beat out the competition. Henry is “officially in retirement” at Carson Springs now, Janks said. “But then, I looked in the studbook, and it was his daughter! I was petting his baby and his granddaughter! I mean, what are the odds of that?” I thought it was so cool that we had one and they had one,” Janks said. “About three years ago, I was in Yulee, Florida,, and they had an Indian rhinoceros female and a baby that I met.

In all of his previous locations, Henry served as one of the most prolific breeders of Indian rhinos in the country, producing at least 25 children and over 30 grandchildren. Henry came to Carson Springs in 2016 from the Tanganyika Wildlife Park in Kansas, but that wasn’t his first time transferring facilities born in India in 1981, Henry called San Diego and Fort Worth home before arriving in Kansas. In 2008, after spending time in South Africa and developing a passion for exotic wildlife preservation, Janks and his wife, Christine, transitioned their 264-acre property from a horse breeding facility to the conservation it is today.

“This morning I told him, ‘happy birthday,’ and he kind of looked up at me from sleeping,” Janks said. He thinks Henry even knew it was his big day. “History was made today,” said Barry Janks, the co-founder of Carson Springs and Henry’s closest human friend. He is the country’s oldest Indian rhinoceros in captivity, according to Rhinos of the World, and is only one of a handful of his species to reach the age of 40. Henry, a 4,600-pound Indian rhinoceros, on Saturday celebrated his 40th birthday at Carson Springs Wildlife in northeast Alachua County, his home for the last 5 years.

A fresh lettuce and watermelon “cake” and a cold hose drizzle awaited Henry the rhinoceros at his milestone birthday party.