Fiona

Letters from Fiona came gradually less and less.

At the Cincinnati Zoo, a baby hippo named Fiona is helping to educate young people, both in the city of Cincinnati, Ohio and across the United States.

Fiona was born at the Cincinnati Zoo in January 2017.

Thanks to special treatments and assistance from hospital workers, Fiona stayed healthy.

Some experts believe Fiona is the smallest hippo ever to survive. She weighed only 13 kilograms at birth. That is one-third the size of a normal, fully developed baby Nile hippopotamus.

A Cincinnati Zoo worker collected milk from Fiona’s mother Bibi by hand.

Her birth weight was so low that Fiona’s caregivers feared she might not survive.

Everyone was worried about Fiona during the first six months of her life. But by her first birthday, she had grown to 318 kilograms, a healthy weight for a hippopotamus that age.

Everyone was worried about Fiona during the first six months of her life.

Maynard’s book is aimed at young readers, telling them the story of Fiona’s struggle to survive, while also teaching them about hippos.