The Colombian authorities detailed that this task intends to transfer at least 70 hippos that live around the Hacienda Nápoles, which belonged to drug lord Pablo Escobar, located 200 kilometers from Bogotá.
The above, as a measure to control its population due to its reproductive capacity and absence of a natural predator, could reach 400 in eight years.
The manager of Animal Protection and Welfare of the Antioquia Environment Secretariat, Marcela de los Ríos Morales, explained to the news agency Associated Press that the plan to take them to India and Mexico has been consolidating for more than a year.
How will they catch the hippos?
The plan to capture them consists of luring the hippos with food and then taking each individual in a “guacal” —a kind of iron container— to be transported by truck overland for a 150-kilometer journey to the José María Córdova international airport. from Rionegro, from where they will leave for India or Mexico.
“It’s possible; we already have experience relocating hippos in zoos nationwide,” explained David Echeverri López, spokesman for Cornare, the area’s environmental authority that would be in charge of carrying out the process.
