The post This Stranded Lion Hangs on for Dear Life to Avoid Hungry Hippos appeared first on A-Z Animals.
Imagine being stranded on a large rock, surrounded by rushing water and nearly twenty angry hippos. This sounds like something out of a nightmare, but for one young lion, it was a real and terrifyingly close call. This YouTube video proves that even the king of the jungle can get caught against overwhelming odds when he is surrounded and threatened by multiple hippos!
Stranded in Unfamiliar Territory
Lions aren’t the best swimmers and generally don’t like going in the water.
©YouTube/Latest Sightings – Original
When male lions reach two to three years old, they are forced to leave the pride they were born into, often by older, more dominant males. While this might seem harsh, it’s a natural process that promotes genetic diversity and prevents inbreeding.
After leaving the pride, these young male lions become nomads and roam alone or in small groups with other males. They continue this nomadic life until they can find and establish their own territory and pride.
The lion in the YouTube video is a great example of a young nomadic male, which explains why he’s alone and in unfamiliar territory. He may have been trying to swim across the river and decided to rest on the rock. Alternatively, he might have even been fleeing from something and sought refuge on the rock, or perhaps he was using the rock to get a better vantage point.
Whatever his reasons, this young nomad clearly didn’t realize he was in hippo territory. Lions rarely confront hippos unless it’s absolutely necessary.
Fortunately, hippos don’t usually go looking for a fight. If other animals leave them alone, hippos will generally return the favor. However, if an animal gets too close to a hippo’s territory, things can get dangerous very quickly. This is particularly true near the end of the dry season, when hippos become more aggressive and territorial due to crowded conditions and limited water.
Why Hippos Don’t Back Down
Male hippos are especially aggressive.
©YouTube/Latest Sightings – Original
Marooned on a rock in the middle of a river, the young lion did the only thing he could: swim away and hope the hippos didn’t catch him. Even though lions are incredibly powerful predators, they simply can’t match the sheer size and strength of a hippo, let alone an entire group of them.
A male lion typically weighs between 330 and 570 pounds. They have strong bodies, sharp claws, large teeth, and a powerful bite. Hippos, on the other hand, are enormous animals, with males reaching weights of 3,500 to 7,050 pounds.
But size isn’t a hippo’s only weapon. They’re also strong, fast, and aggressively territorial. While they might look like they’re lazily relaxing in the water, they can switch into “fighting mode” in seconds. On land, hippos can charge surprisingly fast — up to 19 miles per hour. In the water, they can move around 6 miles per hour. Additionally, hippos have enormous mouths that can open nearly 180 degrees, revealing massively sharp teeth and tusks. Their bite is so powerful that it can snap a crocodile in half.
Survival Against the Odds
Hippos are considered the deadliest large land mammals on Earth.
©YouTube/Latest Sightings – Original
Fleeing would truly be a lion’s only hope against even a single hippo. In a one-on-one standoff, even the strongest and fiercest lion would not be a match for a hippo. Hippos have thick skin that’s difficult to penetrate. This means a lion would need to inflict countless bites, scratches, and other injuries to tire out or subdue a hippo. In that process, however, the hippo would likely land its own blows on the lion, and the lion would not survive long enough to win.
Hippos are herbivores and do not actively hunt lions, although they will fight lions who trespass on their territory. In contrast, lions have been known to hunt hippos when they are starving and have no other food options, but this is always a last resort. A pride of lions could potentially take down a hippo, but it would be a brutal and arduous fight.
Hippos can dominate both in the water and on land, but on land, a lion could potentially outrun a hippo, since lions can sprint up to 50 miles per hour. In the water, on the other hand, there would be no contest; a hippo would almost always win the battle. Even after the lion in the YouTube video escaped the first angry hippo, a second hippo nearly crashed into him from underwater. Fortunately for the lion, the hippo missed its target, giving the lion just enough time to escape.
The post This Stranded Lion Hangs on for Dear Life to Avoid Hungry Hippos appeared first on A-Z Animals.
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