'If I Lived in Colombia, I Would Be Worried'

In Colombia's fabled fight against Pablo Escobar's hippos, it seems safe to say the hippos are winning. For now. Writing at Smithsonian, Joshua Hammer lays out the numbers: Maybe four were left behind when authorities shot the drug lord dead in 1993 and took over his property—including his menagerie of exotic animals—outside the town of Doradal. Today, nobody is quite sure how many roam near the rivers of the Magdalena Basin, but the official government count is about 170, and that seems conservative. Biologists estimate the population will reach 1,400 by 2040 if left unchecked. Accounts of run-ins with humans are percolating with more regularity in local media accounts, and that's not the only issue. "If I lived in Colombia, I would be worried," Rebecca Lewison, an ecologist at San Diego State University's Coastal and Marine Institute, tells Hammer.

"Colombia has great biodiversity, and this is not a system that has evolved to support a mega-herbivore," adds Lewison. Related fun hippo facts on that front: A single hippo generates about 20 pounds of feces per day, and a female can give birth 25 times over her lifespan of 40 to 50 years. The government has tried culling the animals, but the public objected, and it has dabbled in capturing them and shipping them out. All the while, the numbers have kept growing. The latest tactic is to castrate them in the wild, and Hammer provides a first-hand account. One such procedure on a 1,500-pounder is successful but, not surprisingly, a taxing and time-consuming feat. Thus, two biologists tell Hammer that a mass culling may be the only effective way to rein in the population. (Read the full story.)