88 Fun Facts About Giraffe

In one study, which animals spent less time scanning for predators when giraffes stood nearby?

Zebras: researchers found they eavesdrop on giraffes, whose height lets them spot danger from afar, and relax their own watch when the tall lookouts are around.

How many cervical vertebrae does a giraffe have in its neck?

7, the same as a human: each neck bone is simply stretched to about 25 cm, so the giraffe gained its reach without a single extra vertebra.

The leaves of which African tree are a giraffe's favourite food?

Acacia: giraffes work their tongues between its thorns to strip the leaves, though botanists now file most African acacias under the names Vachellia and Senegalia.

What are the horn-like structures on a giraffe's head called?

Ossicones are cartilage that hardens to bone under skin and fur; a calf's lie flat at birth, sparing its mother, and stand upright within days.

Where does a mother giraffe usually leave her newborn calf while she feeds during its first days?

Lying hidden in cover: the calf stays down for much of its first weeks, relying on camouflage, while its mother feeds close by and comes back to nurse it.

What does a bull giraffe taste to check whether a cow is ready to mate?

Her urine: the bull samples it and curls back his upper lip, the flehmen response, which carries the scent to a special organ that tells him whether she is in oestrus.

Which part of a giraffe weighs about 11 kg and measures some 60 cm long?

Its heart: the muscle has to lift blood some two metres to the head, so the wall of its main pumping chamber grows far thicker than in other mammals.

For brief spells of deep sleep, a giraffe lies down and rests its head where?

On its own rump: the neck curls back in a loop for bursts of deep sleep lasting only minutes, because a folded-up giraffe is slow to rise if a predator appears.

Giraffes usually inhabit which two habitat types?

Savannahs and woodlands: giraffes feed from branches, so they go where the trees are and range wherever woody plants dot open country.

How does a giraffe usually reach water on the ground to drink?

Spreads its front legs apart: the awkward stance leaves a drinking giraffe slow to flee, so herds take turns, some drinking while others keep watch.

Like a human fingerprint, which feature is unique to every individual giraffe?

Their coat pattern is fixed for life, so researchers identify thousands of wild giraffes from photographs alone, with no need to catch or tag them.

Which other living mammal is considered the closest relative to the giraffe?

Okapi: the two are the only living members of the giraffe family, though the okapi is horse-sized, striped on the legs and has a neck of ordinary length.

The common English name "giraffe" has its earliest known origins in what language?

Arabic: the word reached English through Italian and French from the Arabic zarafa, which Arabic itself probably borrowed from an African language.

On leaving their mothers, young bull giraffes usually join what kind of group?

An all-male bachelor herd: the young bulls spar with one another there for years, while their sisters tend to stay close to the mother's herd.

A newborn giraffe calf already stands about as high as which of these?

A tall man: at around 1.8 metres on its first day, the calf can reach its mother's udder and nurse as soon as it finds its feet.

Compared with other hoofed mammals, giraffe eyes are larger with a greater surface area of which structure?

Retina: the big light-catching surface gives giraffes sharp long-range sight, so when one stares at danger a kilometre off, the rest of the group turns to look too.

Geneticists say the four giraffe species differ about as much as a polar bear does from which animal?

A brown bear: DNA studies split what was long treated as a single species into four, each with its own region of Africa.

A giraffe's long tongue is dark at the tip, a colour thought to protect it from what?

Sunburn: the tongue spends hours a day stretched out in full sun, and the part that stays inside the mouth is pink, though the idea is still debated.

Which predator is the main threat to a full-grown giraffe?

Lion: an adult's size and sharp eyesight deter most hunters, so lions are the main threat; calves are far more at risk, falling also to hyenas, leopards and wild dogs.

What makes a bull giraffe's head grow heavier and knobblier throughout his life?

Layers of extra bone build up on the skull as bulls age, turning the head into a heavier club that lands harder blows when rivals swing at each other.

What often happens to the blotches of a male giraffe's coat as he grows older?

They darken: in many bulls the blotches turn from brown towards black between about seven and ten years old, though nobody yet knows why, and not every giraffe does it.

Which author wrote The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me, about a window-cleaning giraffe?

Roald Dahl wrote it in 1985 with illustrator Quentin Blake: the giraffe's stretchy neck lets the Ladderless Window-Cleaning Company reach any floor without a ladder.

When a predator approaches, what is an adult giraffe's main means of defence?

Delivering powerful kicks, any one of which can be lethal, keeps adults mostly safe; a mother stands over her calf and kicks at anything that comes near.

In what position does a female giraffe typically give birth?

Standing up: the calf arrives forefeet and head first and drops about two metres to the ground, a fall that snaps the cord and jolts it into its first breath.

Besides camouflage, what second job are a giraffe's dark blotches believed to do?

Regulating body temperature: each blotch sits over a dense web of blood vessels, so thermal cameras show the patches shedding heat like radiators.

How do bull giraffes usually feed differently from cows?

They browse higher up: bulls stretch to full height while cows feed lower and are choosier, picking a richer diet with less fibre.

Giraffes are considered the largest of what group of mammals?

Ruminants: giraffes are the largest of the cud-chewers, and a swallowed ball of leaves can be seen travelling back up the long neck for a second chewing.

When a giraffe lowers its head, what structure in the upper neck prevents excess blood flow to the brain?

A rete mirabile, a net of fine vessels in the upper neck, absorbs the rush of blood; when the head comes back up the vessels constrict and push blood to the brain so the animal does not faint.

Ancient Greeks and Romans named the giraffe after which two animals?

Camel and leopard: to them it looked like a camel wearing a leopard's spots, so English long called the giraffe a camelopard, a word that lives on in its scientific name.

Why do young bull giraffes rarely get to mate before about the age of seven?

Older bulls outrank them: a male is fertile by about four, but dominant bulls keep rivals away from a receptive cow, so the young must wait their turn.

A giraffe's tongue is described as prehensile, which means it can do what?

Grasp foliage: the tongue works between the thorns, wraps around a twig and strips off the leaves, shielded from punctures by a coat of toughened bumps.

How soon after birth can a giraffe calf run around?

Within a few hours: calves stand in about an hour and run soon after, because a newborn that cannot keep up with its mother is easy prey.

Swinging their heads like clubs, male giraffes fight for dominance and mates with which behaviour?

In "necking" bouts, bulls swing their necks and heads against each other; one theory holds the long neck evolved for exactly these contests.

Fossils show the immediate ancestors of today's giraffes lived on which landmass before entering Africa?

Eurasia: early giraffe relatives ranged from southern Europe to India and China, and only the branch that moved into Africa survived to become today's giraffes.

How many chambers does a giraffe's stomach have?

Four: leaves are fermented in the first chambers before the giraffe brings them back to its mouth, so every mouthful is chewed twice.

Which common plant food do giraffes rarely bother to eat?

Grass: giraffes are browsers that feed from trees and shrubs, taking pods, flowers and fruit in season, while grass barely registers in their diet.

Poachers have killed giraffes just to take which body part, prized for bracelets?

The tail: its long tuft hairs are woven into good-luck bracelets, fly whisks and thread, and poachers have cut it off and left the rest of the giraffe untouched.

The IUCN's 2016 Red List assessment moved the giraffe into which category?

Vulnerable: the giraffe had been listed as Least Concern until surveys showed numbers down by more than a third in 30 years, a slide so little noticed it was dubbed a 'silent extinction'.

When walking, a giraffe moves both legs on one side together, a gait called what?

Pacing: both legs on one side swing forward together; when the giraffe breaks into a gallop, its neck rocks back and forth to keep the animal balanced.

Why do giraffe cows leave calves in a 'calving pool' watched by one female?

So mothers can forage elsewhere: the cows take turns as babysitter, which frees the others to wander off to feed and drink before returning to nurse.

Like cattle and sheep, giraffes lack which teeth?

Upper front teeth: in their place is a hard pad, and the lower teeth press leaves against it to comb them from the branch.

A giraffe walks on two toes per foot, just like which of these animals?

A goat: both are even-toed ungulates that carry their weight on the third and fourth toes, whereas horses and rhinoceroses belong to the odd-toed group.

What is blamed most for the fall in wild giraffe numbers?

Habitat loss and poaching: farms, roads and fences carve up giraffe country while hunters take the animals for meat, and numbers fell by over a third in 30 years.

Carl Linnaeus first classified the giraffe as a species of which animal?

Deer: Linnaeus named it Cervus camelopardalis, taking its skin-covered horns for a kind of antler, and the giraffe was given a genus of its own a few years later.

Who brought the first giraffe to Rome, in 46 BC?

Julius Caesar put the giraffe on show for all Rome at the games crowning his triumphs of 46 BC, and later Roman writers were still describing the strange beast.

A giraffe that reached Ming China with Zheng He's fleet in 1414 was presented as which mythical beast?

Qilin: courtiers presented the giraffe as the lucky beast of legend, though the emperor is said to have brushed the flattery aside; in Japanese a giraffe is still called kirin.

The Medici giraffe, a 1480s gift to Lorenzo de' Medici, was sent by the sultan of where?

Egypt: the giraffe is thought to have come from the Mamluk sultan Qaitbay, who was seeking Florentine help against the Ottomans when it arrived in 1487, so the animal was diplomacy on four legs.

How did the Medici giraffe die in Florence in January 1488?

Caught its head in barn rafters: the giraffe panicked, jerked back and broke her neck; Europe would not see another living giraffe until the 1820s, more than three centuries later.

Zarafa, the giraffe gifted to Charles X of France, walked to Paris from which port?

Marseille: after wintering in the port, Zarafa walked the 900 km to Paris in 1827, because officials feared the dangers of the long sea voyage around Spain.

When the giraffe Zarafa reached Paris in 1827, fashionable women began wearing what in her honour?

Towering hairstyles: Parisian women piled their hair high 'à la girafe' and men sported giraffe-themed hats and ties, as the first giraffe ever seen in France became a sensation.

Besides Paris and London, which German-speaking capital received one of Muhammad Ali's three gift giraffes?

Vienna: its giraffe died within a year of reaching the emperor's zoo at Schönbrunn, yet it set off a mania that ran to giraffe cakes, a giraffe perfume and a stage play.

How did Zarafa fit aboard her ship to France?

Neck through a hole cut in the deck: she rode standing in the hold with her head in the open air, and milk cows travelled with her to keep the young giraffe fed.

Giraffe Manor, the hotel where giraffes poke through breakfast windows, is in which city?

Nairobi: in the 1970s the manor's owners brought home a young Rothschild's giraffe named Daisy to save her threatened kind, and a breeding herd grew from there.

At the Giraffe Centre in Lang'ata, what is the main draw for visitors?

Feeding giraffes from a raised platform puts visitors eye to eye with them, and the centre's breeding herd has sent Rothschild's giraffes back into the country's national parks.

April the giraffe's 2017 birth livestream was sponsored by which retailer?

Toys "R" Us backed the YouTube feed as a play on its own long-necked mascot, Geoffrey the Giraffe.

April the giraffe lived at Animal Adventure Park in which U.S. state?

New York: the park is in upstate Harpursville, and the calf took so long to arrive that some viewers suspected the whole pregnancy was an April Fools' joke.

Healthy young giraffe Marius was killed in 2014 amid global outcry at which city's zoo?

Copenhagen Zoo put Marius down in February 2014, saying his genes were already well represented in Europe's zoos, then dissected him before visitors despite offers to rehome him.

Sophie the Giraffe, a French bestseller since 1961, is what kind of baby product?

A teething toy: the natural-rubber giraffe is made to be chewed, and its makers picked a giraffe because exotic animals stood out among the farm-animal toys of the day.

Melman, the hypochondriac giraffe in a DreamWorks animated film series, is voiced by whom?

David Schwimmer voices Melman, and the joke turns in the sequel: wild giraffes with no doctor of their own make the hypochondriac their physician.

Which surrealist painted giraffes with burning manes?

Salvador Dalí set giraffes alight in two paintings of 1937 and called the burning beast a masculine, apocalyptic monster, a portent of war.

Who wrote the children's picture book Giraffes Can't Dance?

Giles Andreae made his name with Purple Ronnie, a stick-figure poet on greetings cards, before writing this rhyming picture book about self-esteem.

What sound does a bull giraffe make while courting a cow?

A loud cough: courting bulls cough raucously, one of a surprising range of calls from an animal once thought silent, which also snorts, hisses and moans.

What produces the hump at the base of a giraffe's neck?

Tall spines on its backbone anchor the huge muscles and ligament that hold up the neck, which is also why a giraffe's back seems to slope down behind the shoulders.

The giraffe is the national animal of which country?

Tanzania: the giraffe is its national animal and is protected by law there, so unauthorised killing can mean prison.

How are the Masai giraffe's markings usually described?

Jagged, leaf-like blotches, often likened to oak or vine leaves, set the Masai giraffe apart from the reticulated giraffe to its north, whose neat patches look like cracked tiles.

The reticulated giraffe is named for a coat marked like which of these?

A net: 'reticulated' comes from the Latin for net-like, after the thin white lines that criss-cross its liver-red patches like mesh.

How can you usually tell an adult bull giraffe's horns from a cow's?

His are bald on top: bulls wear the hair off in fights, while cows and young keep neat tufts, so the horns are a quick guide to a giraffe's sex.

Rothschild's giraffe has no markings below the knee, as if it were wearing what?

White stockings: the lower legs carry no blotches at all, a giveaway that guides and researchers use to pick northern giraffes out from other kinds.

The West African giraffe's last self-sustaining herd survives in which country?

Niger: the herd near the capital once fell to about 50 animals, but protection alongside local farmers has since rebuilt it to several hundred.

Zakouma National Park, stronghold of the Kordofan giraffe, is in which country?

Chad: Zakouma shelters more than half of the roughly 2,400 Kordofan giraffes left, so the future of the whole subspecies leans heavily on a single park.

Thornicroft's giraffe lives only in the Luangwa Valley of which country?

Zambia: the Luangwa Valley herd is cut off from all other giraffes, numbers only a few hundred and has no back-up population in any zoo.

In 2023, giraffes were moved from Namibia to restock a national park in which neighbouring country?

Angola: 14 giraffes travelled from a Namibian game farm to Iona National Park, returning the Angolan giraffe to the country it is named after, where it had died out.

The giraffe's only living relative, unknown to Western science until 1901, lives in which habitat?

Dense rainforest: the animal hides in the forests of the Congo basin, so shy that Europeans long dismissed reports of it as a local legend.

Samotherium, a giraffid with a mid-length neck, is named for which Greek island?

Samos: the name means 'beast of Samos', and a 2015 study of its neck bones found them midway between a short-necked relative's and a giraffe's, a snapshot of the neck in the making.

A 2019 genome study paired the giraffe family with which North American animal as its closest relative?

Pronghorn: the study made the pronghorn's family the giraffe family's nearest kin, the two having split more than 20 million years ago, though the wider family tree is still debated.

One giraffe nerve runs from the brain down into the chest and back up the neck to reach what?

The voice box: the nerve loops under a great artery in the chest before climbing back, a detour of several metres that biologists cite as a leftover of evolution from fish.

Darwin's explanation for the long neck is known as which hypothesis?

Competing browsers: Darwin argued the neck let giraffes feed above rival browsers, though a 2010 study found longer-necked adults died at higher rates in drought, since the neck costs more to maintain.

Lamarck used giraffes stretching for high leaves to illustrate which idea?

Acquired traits are inherited: Lamarck proposed that giraffes stretched their necks over a lifetime and passed the gain on to their young, an idea later undone by genetics.

Why are giraffes thought to chew on old bones now and then?

To get calcium and phosphorus: a fast-growing skeleton that tall needs more minerals than leaves always supply, though how much a giraffe can extract from bone is unclear.

In 2010, scientists built a computer model of a giraffe to test whether the animal can do what?

Swim: the model showed a giraffe would float, but with its front end pulled down and its neck almost flat on the water, so it would swim badly and probably avoids trying.

Which birds pick ticks off giraffes and warn them of danger?

Oxpeckers: the birds eat ticks and flies off a giraffe's hide and hiss when alarmed, but they also sip blood from wounds, so biologists still argue over whether they are partners or parasites.

Giraffe skin has served as a model for protective suits worn by which professionals?

Pilots and astronauts: the tight skin of a giraffe's lower legs stops blood pooling there, the same problem that can make pilots black out, so it became a model for G-suits.

Two life-size giraffes carved in rock thousands of years ago lie in which now-arid region?

The Sahara: the carvings date from a wetter age when the region was green and well watered and giraffes roamed it, and they are the largest known rock engravings of animals.

Zarafa, the giraffe given to France's king in 1827, lived out her days in which Paris garden?

Jardin des Plantes: the botanical garden's menagerie was her home for the rest of her life, and her mounted body is still on show in a museum at La Rochelle.

Thick giraffe hide was traditionally used to make which of these?

Drums: the thick hide also made shields, sandals and whips, and a trade in giraffe skins was running out of East Africa as early as the 1200s.

At what time of day do giraffes appear to hum to one another?

Night: zoo recordings caught giraffes humming only after dark, perhaps to keep in touch; early biologists thought them mute, yet they also snort, hiss, grunt and moan.

The giraffe weevil, a beetle whose males sport an outsized neck, is endemic to where?

Madagascar: the giraffe weevil lives only in its forests, where males swing their long necks like clubs to knock rivals off a leaf.

The reticulated giraffe's population stronghold is in which country?

Kenya holds most of the reticulated giraffes left, around Samburu and Meru, while the species has thinned out across the rest of its range in the Horn of Africa.