BIG LITTLE STRANGER.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 10, 12 January 1929, Page 11

BIG LITTLE STRANGER.

BABY HIPPO ARRIVES.

SON FOR BELLA AND CHARKA.

A TRAGEDY RECALLED

An eight-stone baby, possibly a boy, now noses round the huge bulk of Bella, the benign-looking female hippopotamus wallowing in her pond out at the Auckland Zoo. The interesting event took place early this morning. The mother is not so bright as usual, but the superintendent (Mr. T. Aldridge) is quite satisfied with the way things are going. "She is an excellent mother," he remarked this morning, "and the little fellow has already taken nourishment."

It will be remembered that in September, 1926, when Bella brought the first miniature of herself into the world, the father got annoyed about something, and did the poor little thing to death the day after it was born. These births only happen every two years, under the most favourable circumstances, so that Zoo authorities take the keenest interest in them. In London Zoo, where only one hippo baby was born in fifty years, they made almost as much fuss over it as they would over an heir to the throne.

Charka, the father, who murdered his one-day old infant in 1926, has during the past three months been discreetly withdrawn, and has occupied a bachelor pond higher up, but the iron grating between did not prevent him taking note of what went on in the old home. "Does he know what happened in the next pond?" said Mr. Aldridge. "Well I rather think he does; he has been very restless all the morning."

Charka is only five years of age, while Bella is two years older. He yawned several times in a most bored manner while the mother and child were getting all the attention this morning. One of the bystanders, remembering the fate of the last baby, suggested, when Charka opened about a square yard of mouth, snowing teeth as thick as fencing posts, that perhaps it was not a yawn.

In order to accommodate th,e little stranger the water in Bella's pond was lowered, and when he walks round his back is just out of Most of Bella's bulk stands out, ev?n when she ia lying on her side, which' seemed to be her favourite attitude this morning, with one half her head under water, but with the eye in the oilier half frequently seeking her offspring, nosing about alongside her. /Thte baby is a perfect replica in miniature of his parents, and does not give* tJiat suggestion of "all head and feet ihat a puppy does, for instance. ' f

He was born lender water, feeds under water, and will/probably spend the next week in the sJtme" damp manner. When the time coni/s /or his first jaunt ashore he will make it pick-a-back. The mother will * manoeuvre under water until she gets' the little one on her back, and from that elevated post he will survey the scenery, as he will not have then found his land-legs. No 'trpuble is anticipated when the tiimyeojnes to introduce the baby to its father. The contretemps in 1926 was due tcvthe fact that the parents were left in tfte same pond—which i s not correct jttyjuette in hippo circles This time, things were managed differently, and it is confidently expected to rear this interesting little newcomer.