Bronze Hippo Sculpture by Jonathan Sanders

Hippopotamuses are a firm favourite with collectors of the species and bronze sculpture alike.   Jonathan Sanders’s Hippopotamus Mother and Baby is a gorgeous study of a pair of these rarely seen animals sharing a tender moment. 

Despite its physical resemblance to a pig and other ungulates and being given the name ‘hippo’, which means horse, the hippopotamus’s closest living relatives are actually whales and porpoises. 

Although it weighs an average of one and a half tonnes and has a very stocky torso on short legs, it can reach speeds on land of 19mph, allowing it to easily outrun a human.  This ability, combined with an aggressive an unpredictable nature, perhaps surprisingly ranks the hippopotamus as one of the most dangerous animals in the whole of Africa.

During the day, much of the hippopotamus is submerged under water or mud and even reproduction and giving birth occur in water.  At dusk they emerge to travel up to ten kilometres inland graze on grass and whilst doing so are not territorial, despite being fiercely so when in the water.