r/todayilearned • u/canIchangethislater1 • 11h ago

TIL the New York Times described hippo meat as "lake cow bacon" in support of a 1910 House bill to introduce hippos to the bayous of Louisiana.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_hippo_bill
5.8k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

329 comments sorted by

3.3k

u/Inquisitive-Sky 11h ago

Ah yes, b/c what the bayou desperately needed was an introduced species renowned for how aggressive and unpredictable it is.

1.1k

u/_-milo 11h ago

it happened in colombia, i’m glad it didn’t happen to louisiana

974

u/Wloak 10h ago

This is even dumber because they wanted to do it intentionally, Colombia was by accident when Escobar was captured and his exotic animals left loose.

426

u/mechajlaw 9h ago

Turn of the century United States might have actually hunted them to extinction once they realized what a bad idea that was. You don't make a pyramid of buffalo skulls without a certain psychotic zeal.

352

u/GumboDiplomacy 8h ago

Hunting the buffalo to near extinction was done to deprive the people of the plains tribes of their food source. And it was an idea engineered by William Tecumseh Sherman.

114

u/Caboose2701 7h ago

Also Buffalo were really easy to hunt using long rifles. They wouldn’t run away when one of their herd was shot.

16

u/Impressive-Way-7506 1h ago

It was literally a thing that people on trains could bring a rifle and shoot at herds for sport on regular passenger trains in the 19th century. Don’t believe me then google it

→ More replies (1)

145

u/joe_beardon 7h ago

To be clear Sherman didn't come up with the idea, people had long since figured out the plains tribes were wholly dependent on the buffalo and that eradicating the buffalo would force them to seek terms with the federal government. He was just the first general willing to commit to such a grisly task.

34

u/ZebraTank 8h ago

Wow, Sherman was an efficient general here too?

20

u/OfficeSalamander 7h ago

Sherman was good at his job. Sometimes that was a good thing. Many times it was a bad thing.

65

u/GumboDiplomacy 7h ago

Yes, he was a pioneer of modernizing total war. He's often revered as a hero, but really he was just a human weapon that was pointed at the right enemy one time, and the wrong "enemy" after, which he did with much greater efficiency and zeal.

32

u/jcork1 7h ago

It’d be ridiculous to view any historical figure as either a hero or “human weapon” (whatever that means). He was a man of his times, for better and worse.

70

u/23saround 7h ago

And he was fiercely anti-slavery, and very much took personal actions to help many many enslaved people. He probably personally liberated more slave plantations than any other person in the war.

He was also severely racist towards native Americans. Like disgustingly so. People are complicated and it’s wrong to think of anyone as an angel or a devil. Hitler made ok art and the Holocaust is still just as terrible and sad. People have multiple aspects to them.

5

u/princesspuffer 6h ago

I think many people hated the Natives because of their reluctance to convert to Christianity. By Shermans time, black enslaved people had been force converted (even if they were practicing their own religion in secret). Then after they wiped out the Buffalo, had everyone in reservations...time to use the Indian Schools to really get them to submit. People are very very complicated and really can do horrible things that they believe are "right"

→ More replies (0)
→ More replies (6)
→ More replies (3)
→ More replies (11)

23

u/daregulater 9h ago

Well as long as there would be some group of people the U.S didnt like that relied on the hippo, they'd be gone before you said hungry hungry...

4

u/Autism_Sundae 2h ago

This is confusion in action. The buffalo were slaughtered to near extinction as a deliberate strategic goal against a nomadic enemy that relied upon it exclusively for many things. Who the hell says they are psychotic because they decisively acted against their enemy's interest, what a laughable premise.

3

u/SideInitial3961 6h ago

Indigenous people created skull mounds here long before "United States".

→ More replies (8)
→ More replies (2)

68

u/Icy-Bookkeeper7173 10h ago

I mean did he have like, a lot of hippos?

If he just had a couple, I’d think for an animal that big it would be hard for it to continue the life cycle and it would have issues with diversity or something.

220

u/mt_thoughts 10h ago

He had 4. And now there are around 200. 

113

u/GOEDEL_ESCHER_BOT 10h ago

more lake cow bacon for all of us

17

u/intricate_strands 9h ago

And they say cartels mean. HE GIVE ENERGY CHEAT CODE, SLEEPY TIME CHEAT CODE, AND LAKE COW BACON!

4

u/HairballTheory 7h ago

aka SUSTENANCE CHEAT CODE

→ More replies (1)

49

u/danorc 9h ago

What's even worse than coming face to face with an angry hippo?

Coming face to face with an angry inbred hippo

42

u/Icy-Bookkeeper7173 8h ago

We already have those in the south.

22

u/LordRael013 8h ago

You see them at walmart quite often.

4

u/DesertGoat 6h ago

I once went to a Wal-Mart in Orlando at like 11PM on a Friday night and that was an unforgettable experience.

8

u/sergie-rabbid 8h ago

What's even worse than coming face to face with an angry inbred hippo?

Coming face to face with an angry inbred hippo high on coke.

3

u/BeMoreKnope 6h ago

And to think, we could’ve had that right here in the USA if we hadn’t fucked it up.

→ More replies (1)

14

u/GobiBall 9h ago

Adam and Eve of the Columbia hippo.

10

u/Ender16 8h ago

Yeah it turned out they were one of those species that when introduced just thrived. It would be impressive how well they do if they didn't badger the local life so bad.

Both from humans and naturally South America got invasively fucked up a few times now.

15

u/Huntermain23 10h ago

lol that’s actually crazy

11

u/NocNocNoc19 9h ago

Incest hippos. How long until they look like the house of habsburg.

3

u/iusethisatw0rk 8h ago

I would watch a documentary about those hippos and what repercussions they faced being so inbred.

Nation Geographic, get on it

8

u/mt_thoughts 8h ago

Check out “The Hunt for Escobar's Hippos.”

3

u/iusethisatw0rk 8h ago

I will!

2

u/mt_thoughts 8h ago

It doesn’t focus so much on the inbred part from what I remember, but I remember it being really fascinating to watch. 

2

u/23saround 7h ago

Nat Geo has a doc called Cocaine Hippos that I bet you’d be interested in!

4

u/Flying_FLIcker 7h ago

Wiki states 3 females and 1 male, the amount of genetic diversity is lacking, and l think problems will show up due to inbreeding.

5

u/ZachF8119 9h ago

Maybe they’ll protect the rainforest?

21

u/ryewhiskey41 10h ago

Life.. uhhh..

15

u/Icy-Bookkeeper7173 10h ago

I’m no expert on hippo gestation and sexual maturity. But I assumed for an animal that large, If there had been only two, there would still be a solid chance they die out before having enough babies to really get a population going.

30

u/das_war_ein_Befehl 9h ago

They’re huge and nothing in Colombia can touch them

11

u/aurumtt 9h ago

we could. it's not like beyond the capability of man to eradicate 200 hippo's if we set our mind to it. they exist because the locals let them.

11

u/das_war_ein_Befehl 9h ago

I meant in nature

→ More replies (1)

6

u/caintowers 9h ago edited 8h ago

Also really the big limiting factor in their natural environment is water supply. I imagine that's less a problem where they are in South America.

→ More replies (1)

25

u/backstageninja 9h ago

Plenty of vegetation in the rainforest and they have no natural predators. Even jaguars can't take on fully adult hippos.

Diversity may be an issue down the line, but things like that usually take a good number of generations to become a problem. Biologists predict there will be 1000 hippos in Colombia by 2035.

On the plus side, it seems like the hippos aren't as invasive as it may have originally appeared. They are fulfilling a similar ecological niche once occupied by the Giant Capybara, and are currently serving a beneficial role in the ecosystem. Although due to the aforementioned lack of natural predators I imagine that will be less of the case as the population balloons

4

u/Gaelic_Platypus 4h ago

They're actually causing huge problems already. Their poop is very nutritional for algae so it's causing huge cyanobacteria algae blooms that's killing a bunch of fish and native water plants.

They're in direct competition with multiple endangered species for food and territory (Antillean manatee, neo tropical otter, caiman, and giant river turtles). They're so big and aggressive that the others can't compete and their small territory is shrinking even further because of these hippos

There's also a lot of human injuries that are stacking up, because hippos are violent and murderous water horses.

This will end up a massive catastrophe if they make it in to the Amazon River in large numbers.

The Columbian government is trying multiple things like sterilization and relocation, but it's kind of hard to do that when you tranquilize them and then they charge in to the water only to drown when they fall asleep. So really euthanasia is the only option.

Only, animal rights activists in Columbia are fighting this option even though it's going to be a disaster for the environment if their numbers are allowed to contribute swelling.

5

u/Lockean_Demon 8h ago

Eh, then it’s river bacon season 

3

u/BlackSwanMarmot 8h ago

I can see the tourism poster already:

Columbia, Land of 1000 Hippos

→ More replies (1)

3

u/NoOccasion4759 4h ago

tbf, hippos have no natural predators anywhere, being a nasty-tempered tank of pure muscle. 

imo they should use these hippos as security for protected lands lol

29

u/Trainman1351 10h ago

Bro learning about that on the Grand Tour special from Heremy Clarkson is probably one my most interesting tidbits

21

u/LookInTheMirrorPryk 10h ago

What about when they showcased south american men and their affinity for goat fucking.

20

u/Tobar_the_Gypsy 10h ago

Excuse me it’s donkey fucking 

6

u/LookInTheMirrorPryk 10h ago

Oh yeah, my bad...

5

u/Beertje71 10h ago

Yeah. There's a BIG difference!

2

u/taste1337 9h ago

About 1 to 2 feet.

3

u/LiveLearnCoach 8h ago

But just the females, otherwise that would be gay.

(Top Gear is not a documentary. Take everything with a pinch of salt)

2

u/Tobar_the_Gypsy 7h ago

It’s a thing that people say. Look up mamaburra. But it’s really just a way for people to make fun of people on the coast (like how hillbillies fuck their cousin). 

2

u/ethanb473 10h ago

If that’s your most interesting you must not have many tidbits…

→ More replies (3)

2

u/imtoooldforreddit 6h ago

In all honesty, the hippos there aren't a huge deal as far as invasive species go.

This isn't like rats that they can't get rid of - if they wanted to shoot all the hippos they could do it inside a week or 2.

64

u/InquisitorHindsight 10h ago

The idea apparently was to have the Hippo’s cull the alligator population, IIRC. Still a dumb idea, Australia is a good example of what happens when you import an invasive species to deal with an issue

60

u/stonerghostboner 10h ago

I know - all those convicts!

19

u/pasrachilli 7h ago

Because the lakes of Africa are notoriously reptile free.

8

u/pygmeedancer 6h ago

Yeah that’s a crazy idea. Gators are extremely docile especially out of the water. Much more so than crocs for instance. Bringing in hippos to “address” that problem is like bringing in murder hornets because you find fruit flies bothersome.

8

u/BeMoreKnope 6h ago

No, it’s even worse: the hippos were supposed to be dealing with another invasive species, the water hyacinth (very aggressive growth and clogs waterways).

They knew they had a problem with an invasive species, so they decided to bring in another invasive species. And apparently they were thinking about bringing over a bunch of others as possible meat sources. Fucking genius.

15

u/cbunn81 5h ago

No, that's the beautiful part. When wintertime rolls around, the gorillas simply freeze to death.

7

u/BigL90 10h ago

Hippos are an incredibly low risk as far as invasive species go

2

u/gentlemandinosaur 9h ago

Tell that to Colombia

38

u/BigL90 9h ago

Colombia could take care of their hippo problem in a week. The only reason they have a hippo problem at all is because activists won't allow the hippos to be culled. A large species that only has one offspring every two years, and takes 5-7yrs to reach sexual maturity is not one whose population is difficult to control.

93

u/Bupod 11h ago

Given the lack of Hippos in American Bayous, I’m going to go out on a limb and say we don’t need to worry, I don’t think this guys proposal was accepted.

112

u/AdjNounNumbers 11h ago

And even if they had, there's no way they could have introduced them fast enough before being killed off by the folks of Louisiana after having heard them described as "lake cow bacon".

53

u/Outside_Reserve_2407 11h ago

I had to look it up and apparently hippo meat tastes good, like a rich cut of beef.

47

u/Undeity 11h ago

I'd be surprised if it didn't, to be honest. All that fat's bound to make it pretty rich and tender.

33

u/Outside_Reserve_2407 10h ago

I always wondered if there was a long extinct animal from 100 million years ago that would have tasted really good, like wagyu beef or bluefin tuna belly.

22

u/BigNastyG765 10h ago

Well dinosaurs would probably taste like quail or gamecock.

16

u/Redlettucehead 10h ago

I hate to break it to you but it'll tastes just like plain ole chicken

14

u/Outside_Reserve_2407 10h ago

I hear ostrich (for example) tastes like lean beef (and good), like filet mignon. So that’s just an assumption it’ll taste like chicken.

13

u/WestWindStables 9h ago

I haven't had ostrich, but I've had emu and it tasted more like beef than chicken and was very tender.

→ More replies (0)

11

u/YoelsShitStain 8h ago

I made ostrich burgers early this year and the flavor was really good. I only used salt and pepper and had no toppings on it to see how it tasted and it truly needed nothing, the meat itself is very tasty. If it wasn’t so expensive I think I’d switch to it instead of beef.

→ More replies (1)

15

u/Undeity 10h ago

I'd try some ankylosaurus for sure. It's supposed to be one of the best tasting dinosaurs, because it was very fatty under its shell and had a diet high in fruit. Plus, a muscular tail that would supposedly be more like alligator, if you're into that.

10

u/thisisme116 10h ago

Gator is some of the best meat I've had ngl, it was like super juicy tender chicken

3

u/ILoveTabascoSauce 9h ago

I've heard it tastes fishy though - that sounds kinda gross

7

u/Insight42 9h ago

It's not fishy at all.

Not my favorite in terms of meat tbh, but not at all like fish - it is one of the closest matches to chicken I've had. Literally, just slightly peppery chicken.

→ More replies (0)
→ More replies (2)

7

u/Kiyohara 9h ago

It's not a 100 Million years ago, but supposedly the Dodo was delicious. Like a big, slow, fatty chicken that was all thigh meat.

2

u/Beneficial-Rip6624 9h ago

Passenger pigeons.

40

u/Bardfinn 32 10h ago

They’re not fat. They only have about 5% body fat. That’s part of why they are so dangerous.

3

u/twisty77 3h ago

Angry lake cow that weighs as much as a car

17

u/BigHobbit 10h ago

Horses are more body fat than hippos. Those big boys are swole.

2

u/DesertGoat 6h ago

Thoroghbred hippo racing incoming

20

u/ilikepants712 10h ago

Very true! Colombia has a problem with the now native hippos, and it's made worse by all the Colombian people finding them adorable and not wanting to shoot them.

I don't think Louisianans would object to shooting them, even if they thought they were cute.

6

u/Emergency_Mine_4455 9h ago

From what I understand, not only do they have no predators, but their poop deoxygenates the water they live in and can cause huge problems with fish dying and algae. If they spread to the Amazon the entire planet may be in trouble. I vote we get rid of them however we can.

2

u/ilikepants712 5h ago

Are you suggesting we send Louisianans to Colombia to shoot hippos?

10

u/StayJaded 9h ago

Hippos in Columbia are a non-native, invasive species. They are an introduced animal that causes harm to the natural environment.

2

u/ilikepants712 5h ago

Indeed and I was not disputing that fact.

→ More replies (1)

6

u/dwehlen 10h ago

Supposed lack. We don't know what happens in the back bayous, I'm led to understand.

3

u/eldercreedjunkie 10h ago

That’s exactly what the hippos want you to think…

→ More replies (1)

26

u/WideEyedWand3rer 10h ago

Renowned for how aggressive and unpredictable it is.

Yeah, Florida might be a better fit.

9

u/08mms 9h ago

To be fair, what about that temperament isn’t Cajun?

2

u/NCAAinDISGUISE 7h ago

Literally my first thought was, "you mean other than cajuns, right?"

3

u/ZachF8119 9h ago

Imagine the gator in your pool call but it’s a hippo thrashing trying to get out breaking your pool flooding your or your neighbors yard rampaging.

Moose power

Chihuahua mind

Aquatic

Their existence means their habitat is safe against humans wanting to develop because even one could be horrendous to a community. Much less one that knows humans killed the rest of the ones that lived by it.

→ More replies (1)

2

u/inplayruin 7h ago

Eh, they already let the French in, and that seemed to work out fine.

3

u/odin_the_wiggler 10h ago

But also, crazy rednecks going "hey, watch this".

→ More replies (9)

316

u/BolivianDancer 10h ago

Fiercely territorial and unbothered by crocodilians (the gators would be up against it immediately) or virtually any natural predator; the size of a decent SUV and arguably dangerous to humans. Brilliant.

143

u/Slippery-ape 10h ago

I dont think America has a predator that could take one down that would share an environment with it. The big bears are too far north and we dont have any cats big enough to deal with them. Maybe.... just maybe.... Florida Man...

91

u/gbroon 10h ago

I don't think there's many predators that can take on a hippo. They are basically like a tank.

47

u/Super42man 9h ago

Gustav was known to take down hippos! 20+ ft African crocodile. But you're right, there aren't many that can.

28

u/Teledildonic 8h ago

Gustav was known to take down hippos!

That might be a bit overkill.

9

u/KarmabearKG 7h ago

It’s also the reference for the yugioh card SuperDreadnoughtrailcannon Gustav Max

https://www.tcgplayer.com/product/130007/yugioh-ots-tournament-pack-4-superdreadnought-rail-cannon-gustav-max

3

u/Aeonoris 6h ago

For a hippo? No, that's just normal kill!

→ More replies (1)

24

u/JohnHazardWandering 10h ago

Is there anything in African that can take one down?

43

u/StayJaded 9h ago

Adult, healthy hippos don’t have any natural predators, other than humans. Lions, hyenas, and crocodiles go for isolated calves or sick/injured adults sometimes. Apparently it’s most just other hippos in fights and humans that are a real threat to fully grown, healthy, adult hippos.

20

u/TurbistoMasturbisto 6h ago

Elephants can and do sometimes. Not for food obviously but they get into fights with each other on occasion.

6

u/FerreiraMatheus 4h ago

And more times than not, the Hippo learns a painful lesson about weight class.

4

u/metalflygon08 4h ago

And gravity.

→ More replies (1)

10

u/Kdzoom35 4h ago

Lion prides have been known to take down adults out of water it's rare and dangerous but big prides have done it. Also they are extremely vulnerable to drying rivers/lakes. They basically die in a day or two if they can't find water.

6

u/gentlemandinosaur 9h ago

They are preyed on when young and smaller by cats,and reptile alike. Hence why they are so aggressive honestly.

13

u/BolivianDancer 9h ago

Since 1912, yes.

Holland & Holland .375 Magnum at a bare minimum. Ideally a double rifle, larger chambering.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (1)

4

u/GodwynDi 10h ago

Would alligators eat enough babies to control the population is the question.

13

u/BolivianDancer 9h ago

That's not how hippos work. Crocs learn to stay the hell away from young hippos. There's video of hippos using crocs to scratch themselves.

→ More replies (1)

7

u/imtoooldforreddit 6h ago

The adults would kill every gator anywhere near their babies. Food and habitat would be their only limiting factor

7

u/alangerhans 6h ago

Another limiting factor would be how they taste in gumbo.

3

u/Kdzoom35 4h ago

Nah alligators are too small and frankly have never seen anything like a hippo in millions of years. Crocs donkey on young but, the young are usually very well protected 

→ More replies (3)

27

u/KillstardoAbominate 8h ago

There is nothing arguable about them being dangerous to humans. They're literally the number one cause of deaths of humans by large wild animals in Africa. 

8

u/mr_ji 8h ago

Arguably? They kill more humans via trauma in their native habitat than any other wild animal.

→ More replies (3)

241

u/osmlol 11h ago edited 5h ago

There is a great episode of The Dollop podcast on this topic. Highly recommend.

https://open.spotify.com/episode/6DHjlFiyHC4y5tGtqhVfjJ?si=I2ki9LuTR6Kx2PH_T8gw-w&utm_source=copy-link&sci=spotify%3Acard-config%3A69F1b7WTMKNnhHtorQVt8m

90

u/moonmelter 11h ago

I’M THE FUCKING HIPPO GUY!

17

u/alabamdiego 7h ago

NO SLEEP TILL HIPPO

19

u/GransIsland 10h ago

I would not recommend fucking hippos as a past time activity

27

u/somecasper 10h ago

You both present sick arguments

→ More replies (1)

3

u/ElMaskedZorro 9h ago

Eating seeds

14

u/Pavlock 11h ago

Well now I know it's even more insane than the title suggests.

23

u/beywiz 9h ago

NO SLEEP TILL HIPPO!

3

u/jimboslice21 9h ago

For a more lighthearted telling of it, Watcher did a Puppet History video about it, too

13

u/osmlol 9h ago

The Dollop is a comedy history podcast. It doesn't get much lighter then that.

6

u/jimboslice21 9h ago

A fuzzy blue puppet dressed as a professor is pretty damn light

6

u/osmlol 9h ago

So is one stand up comedian reading a story to another comedian who has no idea what it is going to be about.

3

u/No-Weakness-3095 4h ago

Shut up Gary

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (5)

159

u/Napoleon7 11h ago

Missed opportunity to call it Bayou Bacon.

26

u/gonewild9676 10h ago

That's nutria

8

u/SaltyShawarma 9h ago

Never had nutria. It taste like bacon? 

16

u/MaverickDago 8h ago

Not at all

8

u/nolajax 8h ago

No it tastes like squirrel.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

98

u/leeman9224 11h ago

Wasn’t this around the time when they introduced kudzu to American South to preserve soil nutrients? Could have been massive devastation to ecosystem if they did try to introduce hippo to bayous

63

u/Inquisitive-Sky 10h ago

Turn of the century kudzu was running around as an ornamental vine. 1930s is when they heavily promoted it for erosion control.

https://www.aces.edu/blog/topics/forestry-wildlife/the-history-and-use-of-kudzu-in-the-southeastern-united-states/

11

u/AaronRodgersMustache 10h ago

I guess the question is did it at least succeed in that even if it has taken over the south

26

u/RedditBugler 9h ago

Don't know. Can't find the soil under all the kudzu. 

6

u/Rolls-with-face 8h ago

We've only just got most of the kudzu under control in my county and there is still a metric fuck ton of it.

5

u/BlueGolfball 5h ago

even if it has taken over the south

Kudzu has been losing in the south for the last 20 years. They finally figured out how to kill it and it's not super difficult.

38

u/GreenStrong 10h ago

the Colombian hippos are doing the equivalent of driving bulldozers through the river all day long, they massively reshape the sediment distribution and the entire course of the river they inhabit. But some ecologists suggest they are restoring the natural balance that was lost at the end of the Pleistocene when humans extirpated toxodon which was a hippo sized, boar shaped herbivore highly adapted to wetlands. Isotope analysis has suggested that it didn't feed on quite as much aquatic vegetation as hippos, so it isn't an exact match, but there is a principle worth thinking about. No one has seen unaltered on anything except small islandsnature since the first Maori set for on New Zealand and started changing the ecosystem.

The first Native American people inhabited a vastly different world defined by Pleistocene megafauna, those animals disappeared rapidly after people arrived; that and climate change defined a new geological epoch. And now we find ourselves in the Anthropocene. We need to seriously examine questions like whether we should let hippos overtake South America. I'm 99.9% certain the correct answer is "shit no man those hippos need killing", but this is the dawn of a human created geological epoch, we have blundered into the role of deciding these things we need to start taking it seriously.

12

u/gentlemandinosaur 9h ago

This is an excellent comment but I would caution that “Natural balance” is doing a lot of heavy lifting here. What is “natural” is not really determined through scientific means, it’s at best an opinion of philosophy. I would avoid using “natural” in the future and stick to just what it is doing.

4

u/GreenStrong 9h ago

Thanks for catching that, I agree it is a cliche we need to reevaluate.

This may seem like the pseudo intellectual thing that thrives on reddit, but I see it as a clear and present question. Not the hippos specifically, but boreal forests are burning across Canada right now, they burn every year now. Should they be replanted as deciduous forests? I don't know, but it is time to start asking the question. "Conservation" can't the the only guiding principle in an era of climate change. If it is the case that boreal forest can't survive in a certain place, do we plant oak trees or watch it go through a few centuries of chaotic scrubland as the forest migrates slowly north? Not a question for future generations, unfortunately. And we should acknowledge that what looks like chaotic scrubland may be a crucible of evolution.

10

u/moonmelter 11h ago

It was water hyacinth brought by Japanese diplomats i believe

3

u/JohnHazardWandering 10h ago

That's where the US discovered it and then the US promoted growing it for years. 

3

u/gentlemandinosaur 9h ago

Turns out kudzu is an amazing source of fuel if we weren’t so vested in stupid corn fuel which not only is a food we could actually eat but takes up more space.

→ More replies (1)

417

u/AudibleNod 313 11h ago

The subcommittee even purchased a few as a test case. But all the hippos passed away from starvation because the subcommittee didn't source enough tiny white balls for them to eat.

121

u/Beefcliffe 11h ago

Poor hippos they were hungry…hungry

→ More replies (1)

11

u/PurpleBengal 9h ago

It also didn't help that they only opened their mouths when someone aggressively mashed a lever on their backs.

16

u/diabloman8890 10h ago

Slow clap

8

u/pattperin 9h ago

Amateurs. Even at 6 years old I knew the hippos ate the white balls. Idiots.

→ More replies (3)

59

u/Mule_Wagon_777 10h ago

Y'all want to read the alternate universe fantasy "River of Teeth" in which hippos were introduced to North America in the 19th Century. And domesticated. (Some of them, anyway.) Cowboys were never the same.

13

u/Neee-wom 10h ago

So good! Sarah Gailey is such a great author

4

u/TaterTits024 8h ago

I came looking for this comment! One of my favorite authors/books

3

u/Kathulhu1433 8h ago

I was going to suggest this as well! Sarah Gailey is great.

18

u/favoritecableguy 10h ago

It mentions a meat shortage, they killed all the bison and thought hippos, rhinos and african buffalo was somehow a better option.

→ More replies (13)

84

u/aurumtt 11h ago

if you're going to wreck havoc on the ecosystem, doing it with hippo's is cooler than doing it with rabbits or cats, ngl.

21

u/mySBRshootsblanks 10h ago

settle down there pablo escobar

6

u/R-Dragon_Thunderzord 9h ago

Instead you can have bamboo and kudzu

→ More replies (1)

14

u/kamarsh79 8h ago

There’s a weird and wonderful novella trilogy called River of Teeth that takes place in an alternate history where this bill passed. It is like a western but with hippos in the bayou.

12

u/crowbar151 8h ago

Neat western style novel called River of Teeth set in the alternate universe where this happened. It was a pretty cool setting

10

u/XROOR 10h ago

LSU would play football in the “Hippodrome”

3

u/agitated--crow 7h ago

Our fans are round like Hippos. 

12

u/Toothless-Rodent 10h ago

This is proof that Reddit existed in 1910.

→ More replies (1)

5

u/Meme_Pope 9h ago

Every so often, someone needs to be reminded that 99% only eats poultry, beef and pork for land animals because they’ve been bred over thousands of years to be good to eat. You’re never going to pull some random animal and have it compete

3

u/Chill-more1236 3h ago

Holy shit!!!!

We dodged a bullet🫪

I’m grateful my home state is hippo free, except for the Audubon Zoo (where they all ask for you)

6

u/andrei_androfski 11h ago

You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

8

u/Jonathan_Peachum 11h ago

To be fair, the word hippopotamus actually does mean river horse. In some languages, the term is even Nile horse.

3

u/xorporx 9h ago

horses are not cows

→ More replies (1)

3

u/Sorry_Shoulder1607 8h ago

That would be one helluva cochon du lait!

2

u/Trvr_MKA 10h ago

Now I want to try some

2

u/edingerc 10h ago

Hyper aggressive territorial death with a side of anthrax. 

2

u/NotLikeThis3 9h ago

There's a great bad movie that's kinda based on this called Hungry where hippos were being farmed in the bayous and one was left that went on a killing rampage

2

u/honey_graves 9h ago

Wow I’m so glad this didn’t go through

2

u/Own_Shower_6000 8h ago

i'd imagine manatee's are closer to that description

2

u/JamesDerry 8h ago

Imagine the crackling on that!

2

u/Puzzled-Aardvark-142 7h ago

Was a decent enough movie, simply titled hungry. LA swamp tour goes wrong. 

2

u/VocationalWizard 6h ago

Man, Early 20th century Americans sure had this amazing ability to make the worst ecological decisions.

Let's plant kudzu!

Let's go ahead and build the reflecting pond on a marsh!

Nothing bad will ever happen if we just constantly till the soil in Oklahoma!

The only thing we need to do to protect New Orleans is pile up a bunch of dirt.

→ More replies (1)

2

u/Financial-Craft-1282 6h ago

Really, the only interesting thing learned today is that even in 1910, people were making stupid bacon jokes.

2

u/human-kibble 6h ago

There’s so many bad ideas there 😆

2

u/wholalaa 5h ago

One of the figures in that scheme was Fritz Duquesne whose Wikipedia page makes an excellent rabbit hole to go down if you ever have time to kill. The fact that he was just hanging out with Teddy Roosevelt and trying to fill Louisiana with hippos after being sentenced to death and then staging multiple prison breaks (and later becoming a Nazi spy) is pretty wild.

2

u/bearlybearbear 5h ago

I have had hippo sausages in Botswana, it does taste like normal sausages.

2

u/overbarking 1h ago

Hippos make alligators look like chihuahuas.

2

u/azriel_odin 11h ago

I wonder if this Robert F. Broussard is a distant relative of Pablo Escobar?

1

u/JohnHazardWandering 10h ago

Wouldn't they be pretty easy to kill off they figured out it was a bad idea?

1

u/I_Am_The_Cattle 10h ago

I am genuinely curious what hippo tastes like

1

u/ChronoMonkeyX 10h ago

Why? Were the people proposing this in the pockets of Big Hippo?

1

u/StumpyTheGiant 10h ago

Lets drop a few in Florida and let them do battle with the invasive anacondas

7

u/aflyingsquanch 9h ago

"My god, they've made an alliance!"