Baby hippo, giant tortoise still together

A baby hippo named Owen walks along with its 'mother', a giant male Aldabran tortoise at the Mombasa Haller Park, Wednesday. (AP)

The unlikely couple of a baby hippo and a 130-year-old tortoise were still together—a year after the hippo was separated from its family by last year’s Indian Ocean tsunami.

The relationship between “Owen,” the two-year-old hippopotamus, and “Mzee,” the giant tortoise, surprised conservation workers and made international headlines.

Owen was living with his family on the Sabaki River when massive waves from the Indian Ocean tsunami reached the East African coast. He was washed into the ocean and stranded on a reef.

Residents of Malindi, a small coastal town, used fishing nets to catch him. He then was taken to the Haller Park sanctuary, where he met Mzee and adopted him as a surrogate parent.

Owen may have been attracted by Mzee’s round shape and gray colour that are somewhat similar to that of an adult hippopotamus.

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