A herd of so-called cocaine hippos which escaped from drugs lord Pablo Escobar’s private zoo are to be culled by vets after their numbers spiralled further out of control this past year.

The herd, now nearly 170 strong, bred in the wild from four hippos who ran off into the wild after the cocaine king was shot dead 30 years ago.

Escobar kept the beasts at his bizarre menagerie at his Hacienda Napoles estate in Puerto Triunfo.

Many of his other animals were captured and relocated, but his hippos proved difficult to catch and bred rapidly.

Now Colombia’s Environment Minister Susana Muhamad has announced the start of a cull on the creatures.

A statement released on 2nd November said at least 20 animals will be destroyed this year, reports local media.

Minister Muhamad said the culling will run alongside a sterilisation programme and plans to send the hippos to new homes in other countries like India or the Philippines.

She said: “The first stage of this management plan begins, which next week will show the sterilisation phase of hippos in Colombia.”

“Sterilisation is not the only strategy, nor will it be enough. We cannot control populations with sterilisations alone.

“The procedure is complex and expensive. For between six and seven hours for each individual.

“It has a follow-up stage for each individual. It has risks for doctors and the animal. In any case, there is expertise in the country.”

She added: “The three strategies have to work at the same time.

“Here we are in a race against time in terms of permanent environmental and ecosystem impacts that are being generated and that is why it could not be said that a single strategy is effective for our objective, which is to control the population.

“We seek to implement this plan in the shortest time possible, precisely so that the impacts cease.”

Scientists believe the hippos pose a threat to the area’s natural wildlife since their urine and faeces are toxic and carry a range of dangerous bacteria.

Currently, there are a record number of 166 hippos according to calculations by the Ministry of Environment.

But the total is expected to rise to 1,000 by 2035 if their breeding goes unchecked.

Before he was shot fleeing police, Pablo Escobar was the leader of the powerful Medellin drugs cartel.

His gang was believed to be behind up to 80 per cent of all the cocaine shipped to the US.