The baby hippopotamus born earlier this month at Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden finally has a name. The zoo revealed Monday on NBC's "TODAY" show that the male calf's name is Fritz.
Fritz’s mother, 23-year-old Bibi, gave birth on Aug. 3. Staff at the zoo discovered Bibi was pregnant around April Fool’s Day. It came as a surprise because Bibi was on birth control.
The baby hippo is Bibi's second calf and the first sibling for famous sister Fiona, who became a global celebrity when she was born prematurely in 2017.
The zoo asked the public to help name the new hippo and received thousands of submissions from around the world. The hippo's keepers narrowed the choices to Fritz and Ferguson. After more than 200,000 votes, 56% of the poll preferred Fritz.
Jenna Wingate, a senior keeper at the Cincinnati Zoo, told "TODAY" the name is fitting since Bibi's birth control was apparently "on the fritz."
"Everyone loves an alliteration, but we didn't necessarily do that on purpose," Wingate said. "Fritz just really seemed to fit him. And Ferguson was super cute and we all loved that as well. But something that kind of drew up to the name Fritz was Bibi's birth control was 'on the fritz' and that's how this little boy came to us. We're playing up that and just having a lot of fun with it. He's spunky and fun and it fits."
Amy LaBarbara of the Cincinnati Zoo told "TODAY" last week that it took a few days for staffers to figure out if the calf was a boy or girl because they didn't want to interfere with Bibi's bonding time with her new baby.
The baby boy is "doing everything we want a baby hippo to be do," including swimming, LaBarbara said.
The zoo said Fritz already weighs over 100 pounds and has at least six teeth coming in.
Bibi's first baby, Fiona, only weighed 29 pounds when she was born six weeks premature and wasn’t able to stand on her own. Fiona now weighs 2,000 pounds, the zoo said.
Feeling out of the loop? We'll catch you up on the Chicago news you need to know. Sign up for the weekly Chicago Catch-Up newsletter.
