Doha, Qatar: The largest living land animals, often weighing about 2,000kgs, are better known for gliding through water. Now a recent study has found that while they almost exclusively trot, the fastest-moving hippos spend once up to 15% of their time airborne, despite their size.
Royal Veterinary College (RVC) researchers in England, who studied footage of these creatures, found that their feet leave the ground for up to 0.3 seconds at a time when they are running fast.
The researcher found that, "hippos almost exclusively trot – even when slowly walking or quickly running. This is unusual for land animals, which tend to have a wider repertoire of gaits – for example, rhinoceroses can use a standard quadrupedal walk, trotting and galloping as they increase speed; much like a horse. Additionally, the analysis of the video footage revealed, for the first time, that the fastest-moving hippos become airborne, sometimes for substantial periods (about 15 percent of the stride cycle; or 0.3 seconds)."
???? A new study from the RVC into the movement and gaits of hippopotamuses on land has found that while they almost exclusively trot, the fastest-moving hippos become airborne for substantial periods of time. @JohnRHutchinson
— Royal Veterinary College (RVC) (@RoyalVetCollege) July 3, 2024
➡️ Read more: https://t.co/ULzWVBxRPI pic.twitter.com/VsVTk9FXVq
These findings came up while studying the footfall patterns of two hippos that moved in the paddock of Flamingo Land Resort in Yorkshire. They further went through frame by frame of online videos filmed around the world.
The researchers were trying to find whether hippos had ever been able to lift all four feet off the ground simultaneously.
This aerial phase during their fast trot was a new discovery that so far, is unique to hippos.
Media reports quoted the research professor John Hutchinson as saying that this research would give direction to further hippo research - as to what can baby hippos do in comparison with adult ones and why?
