An Illustrated Guide to Hippo Castration (2014)

(science.org)

37 points | by joebig 4 days ago

8 comments

  • snthpy 2 hours ago
    Short and sweet. An absolute masterpiece of scientific writing!

    A family friend used to run a travel business with tours to the Okavango Delta. When I asked him how it was going, he replied "Great, we've only ever lost one honeymoon couple to hippos"! People don't realise they are one of the most dangerous animals to humans.

  • tumidpandora 1 hour ago
    > hippos' stunning wound-healing abilities—perhaps related to the antibacterial properties of the creepy "red sweat" that coats their skin

    sounds interesting and definitely something worth looking into as well

  • pugworthy 2 hours ago
    I mean, sensationalistic or "Why didn't you post on / This isn't reddit" or not, this is one of the more amazing opening sentences ever...

    > Few things in this world are as elusive as a hippopotamus testicle

    • onionisafruit 2 hours ago
      I was fond of “all the surviving animals were able to return to their feces-infested communal pools within hours of the surgery with no negative consequences”
  • andsoitis 1 hour ago
    Animal cruelty is immoral.
    • mock-possum 6 minutes ago
      > The vets successfully castrated 10 out of 10 hippos with their method, losing only one of the animals to postsurgery complications

      Yeah those are not good numbers.

    • card_zero 1 hour ago
      So is sanctimony, good job nobody around here is being cruel or sanctimonious.
  • gnabgib 2 hours ago
    (2014)
    • aaronbrethorst 2 hours ago
      I don't think much has changed in the state of the art of hippo castration in the last twelve years.
    • RobotCaleb 1 hour ago
      Oh yeah, never mind. Not worth talking about. Didn't happen today.
      • Sniffnoy 1 hour ago
        They're not saying it's not worth talking about. They're saying it should have a date tag, as is customary for old articles on Hacker News.
      • tomhow 53 minutes ago
        Please don't post snarky comments here.

        That user is one of the most engaged, helpful users on HN and it's a long-standing convention that the year is appended to titles of articles that are not current.

  • card_zero 2 hours ago
    [flagged]
  • reify 4 days ago
    [flagged]
  • mbrezu 1 hour ago
    How long before this is included in an AI benchmark? Can't wait :-)