Tag: giraffes

 

For a giraffe, drinking is as necessary as it is for any other mammal.

The very act of positioning oneself to make drinking physically possible is, however, an enormously more delicate, demanding task for a giraffe than for other mammals.

Giraffes’ approach to a waterhole is always slow, tentative, hesitant…and in a group.

Anxiety and hyper vigilance are especially evident at the crucial moment when a giraffe has to decide that it is now “safe” – or not – to get into drinking position.

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Giraffes harvest most of the water they need from the leaves they eat, so they do not need to drink every day.

However, they do need to drink.

On that occasion, the current world’s longest necks are “not long enough”.

As every lion and crocodile knows, the only occasion when it is a good idea to “move in for the kill” on an adult giraffe is when that giraffe is drinking.

Every giraffe is acutely conscious that his or her “killer kick” defence system is entirely disabled whenever s/he has to splay his/her legs to enable his/her neck to reach down far enough to make drinking possible.

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