The pygmy hippopotamus is one of only two extant species in the family Hippopotamidae. It is native to the forests and swamps of West Africa, primarily in Liberia, with small populations in Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Ivory Coast. A distinct subspecies existed in Nigeria until at least the 20th century, though the validity of this has been questioned.
About Pygmy hippopotamus in brief
The pygmy hippopotamus is one of only two extant species in the family Hippopotamidae. It is native to the forests and swamps of West Africa, primarily in Liberia, with small populations in Sierra Leone, Guinea, and Ivory Coast. A distinct subspecies existed in Nigeria until at least the 20th century, though the validity of this has been questioned. The survival of the species in captivity is more assured than in the wild; the World Conservation Union estimates that fewer than 3,000 pyg my hippos remain in theWild. Pygmy Hippos are threatened by loss of habitat, as forests are logged and converted to farm land. They are also vulnerable to poaching, hunting for bushmeat, natural predators, and war. PyGmy hippos are among the species illegally hunted for food in Liberia. The plural form of the pyGmy Hippopotamus name is pygMyHippopotami. A male pygMY hippopotami is known as a bull, a female as a cow, and a baby as a calf. A group of hippopotamids is called a herd or a bloat. The species is classified as a member of either the genus Choeropsis or the genus Hexaprotodon. It is believed to have gone extinct within the last 500 years. The Nigerian subspecies is classified as C. liberiensis heslopi heopis heopi. The Nigerian py Gippopotamus was never studied in thewild and never captured in the early 1940s, but no reliable reports exist after the collection of the museum specimens secured by I.
R. Heslop, a British colonial officer, in the Niger Delta in the 1940s. A sister species may have been the little-studied Malagasy pygmanus, one of three recently extinct species from Madagascar, rather than open rivers. It was the only member of its genus to survive outside West Africa until the 19th century. All agree that the modern pygmys are the only extant member of the genus, and that they are not related to the hippo or the Nile hippo. The taxonomy of the Hippoamidae has changed as understanding of the animal has developed. Some taxonomists group Hippopotami and anthracotheres in the superfamily Anthracotheroidea or Hippopotamoidea. The sub-family Hippopotaminae is used to refer to the group of hippopotamid members that are sometimes known as hippopotams or H Hippopotams. The modern py G hippopotama is the only member of the family of hippopotamas that is still alive and understood to be undergraduate and underwent research in the 20th century. It is classified as H. liberiensis or C. liberiens heslopis he slopi, though this has been questioned by some.
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This page is based on the article Pygmy hippopotamus published in Wikipedia (as of Nov. 14, 2020) and was automatically summarized using artificial intelligence.
