Monday, October 5, 2015

59. Days 16-18 & 20 (Aug 31, Sep 1, 2 & 4) – Giraffe Videos (Eating, Walking and Necking)

Now that we've seen giraffes and learned a bit about them, let's see some videos.  The first video shows three giraffes eating and most definitely not taking advantage of their long necks.  In fact, one could even say that their necks constitute a bit of an impediment in this case.

Giraffes walk in a way that appears to me both elegant and awkward.  They walk by moving the legs on one side of the body together forward, and then moving the legs on the other side of the body together forward.  This is shown in the following video which also includes a nice view of our spotter riding in his location over the front left fender of our vehicle.  It also raises the question, why did the giraffe cross the road.

The remaining videos show a form of behavior among male giraffes known as necking.  And it really is a form of combat.  Those who study giraffes say that necking is used to establish dominance, and that the dominant male generally has great access to females during mating.  To me, the necking bout can seem either fairly intense or nearly choreographed.  Again, giraffe experts divide necking into low and high intensity necking.  Low intensity necking has the giraffes rub and lean against each other with the giraffe that holds itself more erect considered the winner.  In high intensity necking the animals spread their front legs and swing heir necks at each other, attempting to land blows with their ossicones while the other animals tries to dodge and then get ready to counter.  

Let’s look at some vidoes of necking.  Can you classify these as either low or high intensity?



The experts tell us that most necking bouts don’t result in serious injury although there are records of broken jaws and necks and sometimes even death.

A curious aspect of giraffe behavior is found after a duel.  It is apparently common for two males to caress and court and even mount each other.  In fact male-to-male mounting apparently takes place in up to 94% of all giraffe mountings.

I was able to get one example of a necking bout that ended with one male briefly mounting the other.

Next up: crocodiles


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