They are found in Liberia and Cote d’Ivoire in western Africa, along with there also being a few small and isolated populations in neighbouring Sierra Leone and Guinea. The Pygmy Hippopotamus inhabits areas of dense, lowland tropical forest and swampland, where it spends the majority of its time foraging for food and resting on land.

Also, it is nocturnal and forages in the forest at night for a wide variety of plant matter and fallen fruits. Like their larger cousin, the Pygmy Hippopotamus follows well-trodden and marked paths between its feeding and resting grounds and can dart through these tunnels at a remarkable pace if it feels in danger.

The Pygmy Hippopotamus is a herbivorous animal which means that it only forages for and consumes different types of plant matter in order to acquire all of the nutrients that it needs to survive.

Unlike the Common Hippopotamus that primarily (and almost only) feeds on grasses, it has a much more varied diet and consumes a wide range a plants and plant material throughout the forest. It forages under the cover of night eating grasses, ferns, leaves, shrubs and fruits that have fallen onto the forest floor from the branches above.