The giraffe – the highest animal in the savannah. The giraffe is the world’s tallest living land animal and the largest ruminant in the world. The giraffe is called Giraffa camelopardalis in Latin. The reason it is called camelopardalis was because the Romans believed that the giraffe was a mixture of a camel and a leopard.
Facts about the giraffe
| Location: | Sub-Saharan Africa |
| Life expectancy: | 10-15 years in nature |
| Weight: | Weighs from 700 to 1,100 kilos |
| Size: | The height is up to 5.88 meters |
| Food: | Leafy-eating ruminants, leaves and twigs |
| Quantity: | Unknown |
| Fun fact: | Giraffes spend most of their lives standing – even when they are sleeping! |
Characteristics
The giraffe is the world’s tallest terrestrial animal, with a height of about 4.5 to 8 meters. The giraffe’s biggest feature is its incredibly high neck. The giraffe’s neck can be over 2 meters long, making up about half of its total body length. In addition, the giraffe is known for its characteristic spotted fur. The coat is typically in the color brown, where both dark brown and light brown are presented. The pattern of the giraffe may vary depending on the subspecies the giraffe belongs to.
Food
The giraffe spends most of its day looking for food. Giraffes have a great advantage over other herbivores, as with their very long necks they can reach food at completely different heights than the other animals. The giraffe’s favorite food is leaves from trees, creepers, herbs and shrubs. With its 45 centimeters long tongue, they can reach leaves without being stung by thorns. The giraffe typically spends 12 hours each day eating, eating about 60 kilos of leaves and shoots a day. The giraffe does not drink much water during the day, but mainly only gets water from its food, such as plants and leaves.
Pregnancy
The giraffe females go pregnant about 14 to 15 months. The giraffe comes into the world with a real bang. The giraffe female gives birth standing up, which means that the baby falls about 2 meters when it is born. When the giraffe female gives birth to its young, the young are about 2 meters tall and weigh 50 kilos. After a few hours, the giraffe can walk on its own and follow the mother for about 18 months. In fact, it is said that during the 18 months, the giraffe is in “kindergarten”, where it learns the essential things to remember as a giraffe on the wild savannah.
Herds
Giraffes are herd animals. The flocks are usually made up of 50 different giraffe members. Especially for giraffes is that their flocks do not have permanent members. The members can change from day to day, or whenever they want. When you see giraffes from the outside, it does not look like they are herd animals, because they are most often scattered apart. They are so scattered that it may seem as if they have nothing to do with each other at all. However, one will never be able to see the hungry giraffe without its young. .
Family
There is only one species of giraffe in the world, and this species is found only in Africa. However, the individual giraffe species is divided into 8 subspecies and breeds. The way one can see the difference between the different species is mainly on their pattern. The pattern on the skin is not the same on all giraffes. Each individual breed has different patterns on the skin. The pattern shows not only what species the giraffe is, but also how old the giraffe is. The darker the pattern, the older the giraffe and vice versa. In addition, each pattern is unique, which works like fingerprints in humans, there is no other giraffe that has the same pattern.
Travelers’ questions about the giraffe
Is the giraffe’s tongue really blue?
Yes, the giraffe’s tongue is blue. The blue color protects the giraffe from sunburn. The dark, blue color is a kind of sun filter, which of course helps the giraffe not to get scalded. The tongue is out in daylight most of the day, which is why protection is needed. The giraffe’s tongue is about 45 centimeters long and is specially adapted to the giraffe’s livelihood. Namely, eating parts of both plants and trees that seem inaccessible to animals other than giraffes. The reason for the giraffe’s food is inaccessible to other animals, is partly due to the height the food is at, but also the plants the giraffe can reach with its long tongue, which can get past thorns and the like. .
Is the giraffe dumb?
There are many myths that the giraffe is dumb because you simply cannot hear it when it moves in nature. However, the giraffe is not dumb. The giraffe communicates by vibrating the air around and in its throat. The giraffe has a vocal cord, but this vocal cord works very differently from other animals. The vocal cords are capable of making both infrasound and audible sounds. These sounds work really well for the giraffes when they need to warn of any enemies approaching.
Are giraffes fighting?
Yes
Surprisingly, giraffes fight quite often. However, only the hangiraffe is beaten. The time they fight is during the mating season, where they fight over who should mate with the hunger raven. The way they fight is with their long necks. They hit their necks against each other, which can look very comical. When fighting with their necks, they also use their small hair-covered horns to stab each other with. The fights often last only a few minutes and rarely end in injury.
Why do giraffes pee on each other?
There’s a very unusual reason why they do that. The urine taste of the hunger raven reveals whether she is mated to mate with the hanga raven. The male giraffe can thus know when the female is ready for mating by the female regularly urinating the male giraffe in her mouth. The female therefore urinates the male in the mouth, and when her urine taste changes, the male knows that she is ready for mating. The reason is that the mating season for hungry giraffes is very short. Hungry raffles will only agree to mate for short periods every 2 weeks. This means that the male must be fast if he wants to mate with the female.
Do giraffes sweat?
No, giraffes do not sweat. Giraffes do not sweat because they are able to regulate their body temperature according to its surroundings. Therefore, when giraffes roam the savannah of Africa, their body temperature is also hot and they therefore do not suffer from overheating. This also allows them to minimize their water consumption, which is good for an animal like the giraffe, which has difficulty reaching the water with its high body and long legs.
