Rescued Baby Hippo Drinks From Bottle
Published on February 16, 2017
The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust in Kenya is used to raising orphaned elephants, but they shared recently that they’ve been nursing a baby hippo back to health. The tiny calf was spotted stuck in a drying pond in a remote area. The baby was observed for a few days to ensure the mom wasn’t coming back, then plans were made to rescue her. She was flown to the DSWT headquarters in late December, and has been hand-raised since then by Frans, who’s been like a surrogate mom to the hippo. She was just a month old when she was found. Rescuers at first thought the baby was a boy and named him Humphrey. Later, they realized the baby was in fact a girl, so her name was shortened to Humpty. Even though she now has a new keeper, Joseph, she still adores Frans — and everyone who’s helped her. The DSWT shared this cute photo of her drinking out of her bottle on Facebook Wednesday. “Humpty may love her bottle now, but teaching her how to drink from it was quite a trick,” the caption reads. — Read it at the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust’s Facebook