At 18 feet tall, giraffes are the world’s tallest land mammals. Giraffes weigh between 1,750 and 2,800 pounds. They inhabit the forests and open plains of the African savannah. Giraffes are herbivores and they have only three natural predators which are: humans, lions and crocodiles. They can live to be as old as twenty-five years old, the oldest giraffe on record was forty years of age when she was euthanized due to health issues. Today there are around 80,000 giraffes living and they are far from being endangered. These fascinating animals roam fifteen countries on the continent of Africa. The gestational age for giraffes is fourteen months. Giraffes give birth standing up and the newborn calf must fall five feet to the ground during this process. The umbilical cord is only three feet long and will break during the fall. Neither the fall, nor the
…show more content…
The long neck of the giraffe is an advantage because it allows them to reach food that other animals on the savannah cannot. The giraffe also has a particularly long tongue, around twenty-one inches, that makes it possible for them to reach leaves closer to the trunk of the trees. They can eat as much as seventy-five pounds of food a day. They will eat for sixteen to twenty hours a day and must travel long distances in order to get enough food in each twenty-four hour period. Giraffes take considerably small bites for their size, they only eat a few leaves at a time. This accounts for the amount of time they will spend eating during a single day. Giraffes eat their food many times over, much in the way domestic cattle does. They regurgitate food they have already ingested and re-chew; during this process the food becomes cud. The giraffe drinks very little water. Since giraffes spend their lives on the African savannah, where water is scarce, they have adapted to living on very little
The long neck of the giraffe is an advantage because it allows them to reach food that other animals on the savannah cannot. The giraffe also has a particularly long tongue, around twenty-one inches, that makes it possible for them to reach leaves closer to the trunk of the trees. They can eat as much as seventy-five pounds of food a day. They will eat for sixteen to twenty hours a day and must travel long distances in order to get enough food in each twenty-four hour period. Giraffes take considerably small bites for their size, they only eat a few leaves at a time. This accounts for the amount of time they will spend eating during a single day. Giraffes eat their food many times over, much in the way domestic cattle does. They regurgitate food they have already ingested and re-chew; during this process the food becomes cud. The giraffe drinks very little water. Since giraffes spend their lives on the African savannah, where water is scarce, they have adapted to living on very little