Watch the Fierce Strength This Mother Hippo Has Over Her Calf Against Her Hippo Family

Hippos are highly social animals that live in groups of around 40 to 200 individuals. However close the group bonds may be, a female hippo will leave the herd when she is about to give birth. She gives birth alone and raises her baby for a few weeks by herself before introducing him back into the pod. The reintroduction is a critical moment for both mother and baby. The pod may not recognize the mother as a former group member, or they may reject the calf. BBC Earth managed to film the instance when a mother and her baby returned to the herd. The video shows that this is not always a peaceful reunion.

What is the Hippo Pod Social Structure?

Hippos are social animals that live together in groups, called herds or pods. The pods consist of adult females, a few adult males, and their offspring. Each group has one dominant male leader. If the other adult males, who are usually younger, behave submissively, the dominant male will allow them to remain. The dominant male has mating rights with all of the females in the group.

Hippos communicate with each other through body language and vocalizations. Hippos make a lot of different noises, including grunts, wheezes, honks, and squeals.  Researchers believe that hippos can distinguish between the calls of their own group and those of strangers.

Male hippos may exhibit aggressive behavior over mating rights, territory, and resources. They will wag their tails back and forth while defecating, spraying droppings around the area to assert their dominance. Females, on the other hand, can be very aggressive when protecting their young.

Mother-Calf Relationships and Bonds

The mother-calf bond is a critical one. The world is a dangerous place for a baby hippo. They weigh much less than the adults. They are also prey for many other animals, including lions, hyenas, and crocodiles. Not only that, young calves also have to worry about attacks from other hippos, even those within their own pods.

The best chance a hippo has of reaching adulthood is staying close to its mother. Mothers and new babies spend the baby’s first several weeks alone together, reinforcing their bond. When baby hippos stick close to their moms, and the moms in return keep a watchful eye on the babies, they have a much higher chance of surviving to adulthood.

Bringing the New Calf to the Pod: Social Acceptance and Integration

In the BBC Earth video, the narrator explains that a new mother is introducing her calf to her pod. Located in Botswana’s Okavango Delta, the mother has taken care of her baby on her own for several weeks, but the day has come for them to return to the group.

The narrator explains, “Returning to the pod is inevitably risky. The mother has to re-establish that she’s a member of the pod. And in the excitement, a clumsy adult could crush her calf.”

The first group member they meet is the dominant male. Though he stands in her path, he ultimately moves out of the way, letting the mother and baby pass. Surprisingly, the real danger comes from the grown daughter of the mother.

A Mother’s Protective Intervention

The little calf’s older sibling may be jealous or perhaps just curious. Hippos stay with their mothers until they are fully grown, which is about eight years. Although this mother left for a short time to have another baby, she will stay with her previous children until they are mature. And even after that, female children may remain with their mother’s pod through their lifetimes.

Although we can’t know the older sister’s motivation, the result is danger for the baby. This little one is too small and weak to be pushed around as aggressively as the older sibling is doing. But the mother isn’t going to stand back and watch her calf get injured. The mother hippo takes over, chasing and biting at the unruly grown child.

According to the narrator, the pair remains on the periphery of the pod, but near enough that the group can still hear them.

Underwater Filming Provides Stunning Footage

In this video from BBC Earth, underwater cameras give us amazing footage of the hippos in their watery realm. Although they spend much of their time in water, hippos can’t actually swim. Their bodies are too dense to float. Instead, they bounce off the river bottom using their webbed feet.

Hippos often mate in water and can give birth either in water or on land, depending on the circumstances. Once the calf is born, the mother pushes it up to the surface so it can take a breath. She stays by her baby’s side in the water until the baby is a few days old, when they leave so she can graze at night. Mothers nurse their babies underwater as well.