120-YEAR-OLD GIANT TORTOISE ADOPTS BABY HIPPO *PIC*

by Via_Email, Friday, January 07, 2005, 04:18

Tortoise Adopts Stray Hippo at Sanctuary

Thu Jan 6, 9:55 AM ET

NAIROBI (Reuters) - A 120-year-old giant tortoise living in a Kenyan sanctuary has become inseparable from a baby hippo rescued by game wardens, officials said on Thursday.

The year-old hippo calf christened Owen was rescued last month, suffering from dehydration after being separated from his herd in a river that drains into the Indian Ocean.

"When we released Owen into the enclosure, he lumbered to the tortoise which has a dark gray color similar to grown up hippos," Sabine Baer, rehabilitation and ecosystems manager at the park, told Reuters.

She said the hippo's chances of survival in another herd were very slim, predicting that a dominant male would have killed him.

However, Owen's relationship with the Aldabran tortoise named Mzee, Swahili for old man, may end soon. The sanctuary plans to place Owen with Cleo, a lonely female hippo.

FULL ARTICLE:
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=573&ncid=757&e=1&u=/nm/20050106/od_nm/kenya_hippo_dc