The Hindu : International : Houdini is caged

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Dec 12, 2004

International

International

Houdini is caged

JOHANNESBURG, DEC. 11. It took 10 months, a helicopter, six tranquilliser darts and a night-time chase through reed beds, but Houdini the hippo has finally been caught.

The two-year-old male calf's sojourn on the outskirts of Cape Town ended on Friday, when it was cornered by conservation officials who had stalked it since it escaped from a nature reserve in February.

"It went off chaotically, but extremely well," said a Rondevlei nature reserve manager. "We have learned a lot about hippo behaviour in very difficult and unusual circumstances. At one stage there were two of us on the animal's back but it just kept on going."

Hippos are herbivores and can weigh up to 800 kg. They are also surprisingly quick and aggressive. Conservationists prefer to dart them on land because in the water they risk drowning.

After a three-hour pursuit through wetlands near Zeekoevlei, a rural area bordering suburban homes, they bagged their quarry. The reserve manager said that if a hippo escaped again, the rescue teams would be better equipped, as they had "worked through all the alternatives."

The hippo got away when a thief stole a digger and wrecked part of the fence. This was the first escape since the species was reintroduced to the Rondevlei in 1981. The calf's bid for freedom was possibly prompted by the bullying of an older male.

Conservationists in a helicopter and on foot spotted it in shallow wetlands several times but failed to lure it back to the reserve through capture funnels. They said an army of hippos could hide in such terrain.

Cape Talk Radio named the creature Tannemanne, colloquial Afrikaans for "teeth man."

Hippos reputedly kill more people in Africa than any other animal but warnings about the lumbering vegetarians were not being taken seriously, the manager said. "Capetonians generally do not know much about hippos, and how dangerous they can be." He complained that some people waded into water to get a closer look at Tannemanne.

A former beauty queen on safari in neighbouring Botswana was lucky to escape with her life earlier this year, when a hippo attacked and bit her feet.

- Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004

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