A Sad Day for the Zoo

I am so sad. Happy the Hippo is leaving the zoo. He's probably one of my most favorite animals to visit. (I'm also a big fan of the giant pandas, the otters and the beavers.) It's always fun to watch him for long periods of time. If you only watch him for a few seconds, he might not move much. But he'll eventually come up for air or waddle around in his pool or make funny noises.

Anyways, I think Happy is fabulous. He's a 28-year old Nile hippo. Nile hippos can grow to be 15 feet long and weigh up to 8,000 lbs. Happy's diet consists of seven pounds of herbivore grain pellets, 35 pounds of hay, one and a half pounds of fruit and three pounds of vegetables. Yeesh!

I'm happy for him though. He's moving to the Milwaukee County Zoo, and he'll be sharing his new pad, which includes a pool and sandy beach, with two possible girlfriends, Puddles and Patty.

Make babies, Happy!