In November last year, staff from False Bay Nature Reserve spotted a dispersing hippo in Rondevlei, probably having been pushed out of the main herd.

Staff helped to move the animal to a pan at the Strandfontein Cape Flats Waste Water Treatment works, as, due to hippo dynamics that could endanger its life, it needed a new home.

Finding a suitable home for a hippo can be a challenge. However, Bergsig, a game farm in Mossel Bay, had contacted the False Bay Nature Reserve a couple of years earlier, enquiring about potentially sourcing a hippo to complement the other hippo on site.

Having met all of the necessary requirements, Bergsig was chosen as the hippo’s new home and the City of Cape Town’s Biodiversity Management branch recently successfully relocated the animal.

Two days after the new hippo’s arrival she was seen with the resident male, ‘Fatboy’ and since then, they have been spotted together nearly every day – an unexpected happy ending for all concerned.