The video shows the horrifying moment when a massive crocodile devours a newborn hippopotamus as it floats in its jaws.
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The defenseless hippopotamus still has its umbilical cord attached while the crocodile bites into its flesh.
Frankie Adamson, a wildlife photographer who worked as a resident photographer for the safari company Governors’ Camp Collection, filmed the incident on the banks of the Mara River in Kenya.
Describing vividly how this horrifying encounter unfolded, Adamson says there were no other hippos in this part of the river.
After grabbing the baby hippo, the crocodile initially remained in the water but began to shake the carcass when disturbed by fish trying to take a bite of its prey.
“He began to lift the carcass out of the water very violently,” the photographer told Live Science.
“The crocodile already had the baby hippo clamped in its jaws when I approached, and I was sure it was already dead,” he recalled.
The crocodile held onto the calf for 45 minutes before swimming away with its prey, Adamson said.
This is a rare sighting – crocodiles typically don’t bother adult hippos.
However, Adamson suggests that this crocodile may have seen the calf as an easy catch, given its size and inexperience in the hostile environment.
Growing to about five meters, Nile crocodiles would make light work of a baby hippo.
However, a mother hippo, averaging around five meters in length and weighing up to 4,500 kilograms, could easily overpower and kill a crocodile.
“It certainly isn’t always that these ruthless predators snatch newborn hippos away from their mothers – in fact, as opportunistic as crocodiles – they often avoid hippos because they know how aggressive an enraged hippo can be,” wrote the Governors Camp Collection in a post on Instagram.
Video reproduction Instagram @governorscampcollection
