Free Republic

Victim said he had 'a relationship with the most dangerous animal in Africa'A South African farmer was reportedly mauled to death on Sunday by his pet hippo, which he had previously referred to as "like a son to me." Marius Els, who lived in the Free State province of South Africa was found dead in a river, having been bitten repeatedly by the animal. Els, 40, had adopted the hippo, whom he had named "Humphrey," when it was found as a calf. Earlier this year footage of Els riding the more than 2,000-pound beast went viral.

Lizzo hopped on Instagram Live with Black Visions Collective, a Minnesota-based, Black-led organization that empowers Black queer and transgender people, on Friday (June 5) to talk about pushing the Black Lives Matter movement forward.Although she's been taking it to the streets of Los Angeles, Calif. with other celebrities outside of Mayor Eric Garcetti's house over the weekend ("It was so inspiring to see the black joy," she mused), a part of Lizzo's heart remains in Minneapolis. "I knew Minneapolis would always be a part of the revolution!" she exclaimed before Omeoga and her shouted in tandem, "Prince always knew!""Artists who...

A sudden run in an inflatable hippopotamus ballerina costume may represent the desperation American families are experiencing to get close to loved ones during the coronavirus pandemic. An example of how the costume helped a family member get around social distancing restrictions was seen last week at the Fox Trails Senior Living Home in Stephens City, Virginia.

About 500 people are killed in hippopotamus attacks each year. On Saturday, Kristen Yaldor was almost one of them. The 37-year-old American woman was on a river safari tour with her husband, Ryan, when she was suddenly attacked by a hippo that was said to be protecting her calf. The couple was on a guided canoe safari on Zimbabwe’s Zambezi River. Led by tour operator Wild Horizons, the safari group had three guests and two guides. While canoeing down the river, one of the guides spotted the hippo on the river’s right bank. He reportedly instructed the group to paddle...

All a cute, curly haired 10-year-old girl named Gayla Peevey wanted for Christmas in 1953 was a hippopotamus. And amazingly enough, after "I Want a Hippopotamus For Christmas" became the biggest hit song of that holiday season, she actually got one, a 700-pound baby named Matilda. She promptly donated it to the Oklahoma City Zoo, where it lived to be nearly 50, a ripe old age for hippos. As for Peevey's song, it may never die. "That one just really took off, and it's still going strong, stronger than ever. Sixty-three years later! Hard to believe," Peevey, an ebullient woman...

The hippo who tried to kill me wasn't a stranger – he and I had met before a number of times. I was 27 and owned a business taking clients down the Zambezi river near Victoria Falls. I'd been working this stretch of river for years, and the grouchy old two-ton bull had carried out the occasional half-hearted attack. I'd learned to avoid him. Hippos are territorial and I knew where he was most likely to be at any given time. That day I'd taken clients out with three apprentice guides – Mike, Ben and Evans – all in kayaks....

The rich heritage of Tunisia, maybe the only place where the Arab Spring stands a chance Modern-day Tunisians, more Westernized than most Arabs, see themselves as descendants of the great Carthaginian general who invaded Italy. The Arab Spring began in Sidi Bouzid, a small Tunisian town, at the end of 2010. In a desperate protest against the corrupt and oppressive government that had made it impossible for him to earn a living, food-cart vendor Mohamed Bouazizi stood before City Hall, doused himself with gasoline, and lit a match. His suicide seeded a revolutionary storm that swept the countryside and eventually...

Link to Facebook page (with discussion and news): Restless Heart on Facebook.com Filmed in Europe, RESTLESS HEART is the first full-length feature movie on St. Augustine. Born in North Africa, Augustine studied in Carthage, becoming an accomplished but dissolute orator. After converting to Manichaeism, a guilt-free religion, he was called to the imperial court in Milan to serve as an opponent to the Christian Bishop Ambrose. But when the Empress Justina sent imperial guards to clear out a basilica where Augustine's mother, Monica, was worshipping, her constant prayers and the witness of Ambrose won him over to Christianity. Serving in...

Adorable Harry the hippopotamus is no stick-in-the-mud when it comes to making friends with humans. The six-day-old pygmy hippo calf is filling the time of his doting carers after being rejected by his mother at birth. The 11lb baby was born last Thursday at a wildlife sanctuary in South Africa and requires round-the-clock care. Read more.

Meet Harry the hippo, a baby pygmy so small the average person could carry him around with ease. Harry, named after Britain's Prince Harry, was born last week at the Cango Wildlife Ranch in South Africa, the Star reports. His handlers are being forced to hand-rear Harry after his mother Hilda refused to feed him. Keeping Harry healthy is a priority, as there are only an estimated 3,000 pygmy hippos left in the wild.

“This Area Is Off Limits.” That was the warning two hippos sent to boat-riding tourists watching them swim in a lake. If these tourists were hoping to see a ballet-dancing hippo, they were probably disappointed. Far from expected, a pair of hippos, dipping in an African lake, chased them instead. With only its head protruding from the water, one hippo carefully observed the boat. The hippo then suddenly swam under water and began tailing the safari boat. “We’re being chased by a hippo,” a man said, laughing, as the eager hippo continued to follow them. It only gave up when...

A South African farmer has been killed by the pet hippopotamus he raised from the age of five months, and which he once described as being 'like a son' to him. Humphrey the Hippo gouged owner Marius Els, 41, to death by repeatedly biting him in a vicious attack on Saturday night. The farmer's mutilated body was discovered submerged in a river running through his 400-acre farm in rural South Africa. ... Hippos are considered to one of the world's most dangerous animals. They are, by nature, very aggressive -... They commonly attack humans with no apparent provocation, usually using...

After hours waiting beside an African river, Arnaud Germain thought he finally had the perfect shot of his favourite bird. But as the wildlife photographer trained his lens on the colourful kingfisher, he got a rather different snap than he was expecting. All of a sudden, a crocodile and a hippo burst from the tranquil waters straight in front of him, locking jaws in ferocious battle. Arnaud desperately tried to refocus his camera on the river monsters as they fought on the banks of the Shire River, in the Liwonde National Park, Malawi. After hours waiting beside an African river,...

The hippo is most dangerous animal in the whole of Africa. But they're not all bad - as these incredible pictures show. A South African farmer has developed a friendship with one that is so trustworthy, the hippo helps him cross lakes on his 400-acre farmstead. Marius Els breeds 20 different species of wildlife on land near Petrus Steynlakes, including giraffe, buffalo, rhinos and antelope. But he has a real soft spot for Humphrey, whom he bought aged just five months and allows to roam free. He even built a dam to create a 200m wide and 18m deep lake...

Nikica, the hippopotamus walks partially submerged in a flooded yard at a village in Berislavci, about 15 miles south of the Montenegrin capital of Podgorica.

"Zorro was out of the water when he was attacked by the rhinoceros bull," said City Veterinarian Elzette Jordan. She said Zorro became famous after he escaped from Rondevlei Nature Reserve in 2009. At that time he was attacked and forced out of the reserve by his father and went on to make his temporary home in the Strandfontein sewage works.

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Officials at the Topeka Zoo say delays in getting a hippopotamus shipped to a zoo in San Francisco might mean the 5,500-pound animal will have to be shipped through Federal Express.

Sometimes, strange and wonderful things happen within the world of African wildlife. A few weeks ago at Sanctuary Olonana, a luxury camp in the Masai Mara National Reserve, Kenya, Mother Nature looked the other way while the nature of a mother hippo took over. An infant wildebeest accidentally ended up in the middle of the Mara River, helpless and gangly and unable to swim. The calf had been crossing the river with its own mother (as part of the wildebeest migration, one of the natural wonders of the world), but was swept away by the strong current. The little guy...

A young hippopotamus in Kenya, has formed a bond with a 100 year old tortoise. The story and photos come from a former Panamanian resident now living in Uganda. The “baby” hippopotamus, less than a year old, survived tsunami waves on the Kenyan coast, and became attached to a giant male century-old tortoise in an animal facility in Mombassa after being rescued from the Indian Ocean. The hippopotamus, nicknamed Owen, weighs about 300 kilograms (650 pounds), The a male tortoise, about a century old, seems to be very happy with being a 'mother',' said ecologist Paula Kahumbu, who is in...

A veterinarian is lucky to be alive after the hippopotamus he was testing a new sedative on woke up and attacked him. The hippo was not so lucky, however. The 3.5 ton hippopotamus lived in South Africa's Kruger National Park and was being experimented on by Dr Markus Hofmeyr with a new kind of sedative for animals. Sky News reported that the tranquilizer the vets normally used was too strong for hippos because it was made for elephants and rhinos. The hippos would often drown with that sedative because their heads would fall under the water. According to The Sun,...