Amazing hippo facts

Hippos have been clocked at 30 mph (48 km/h) while running short distances, faster than an Olympic sprinter.

Their specific gravity allows them to sink and walk or run along the bottom of a river.

For additional protection from the sun, their skin secretes a natural sunscreen substance which is red-colored. The secretion is sometimes referred to as "blood sweat," but is neither blood nor sweat.

In Colombia, Pablo Escobar maintained four hippos in a private menagerie at his residence in Hacienda Napoles, 100 km east of Medellín, after purchasing them in New Orleans. They were deemed too difficult to seize and move after the fall of Escobar, and hence left on the untended estate. By 2007, the animals had multiplied to 16 individuals and taken to roaming the area for food.

Adult hippos can't actually swim and are not generally buoyant. When in deep water, they usually propel themselves by leaps, pushing off from the bottom. Young hippos are buoyant and more often move by swimming—propelling themselves with kicks of their back legs.

Hippos attack humans and boats. Steve Irwin, who used to toy with crocodiles for fun, considered a five-minute sequence crossing a river filled with a hippos to be the most dangerous thing he ever filmed.

The Discovery Channel recently broadcast footage of a hippo eating a wildebeest. The hippo first pushed two crocodiles out of its way with its gigantic snout to get to the wildebeest; the crocodiles put up no resistance at all.

A park ranger in Africa recently sprinted over a hundred yards to survive a hippo attack.

To mark territory, hippos spin their tails while defecating to distribute their excrement over the greatest possible area.