This movie illustrates the adventures of Alex the lion, Marty the Zebra, Gloria the Hippo and Melman the Giraffe that escaped from the New York Zoo, together with a group of mischievous penguins. Among them, Melman is the most awkward, receiving constant treatment, for imaginary medical problems. In the zoo, he wanted to be tested for many ailments; undergoing MRIs, CAT scans, subjecting himself to injections also being put in braces and using crutches, for no apparent illness. From the first movie itself Melman is worried about a brown spot on its neck; but Melman is a giraffe and has brown spots all over its body, it is the way
giraffes
are meant to be. An interesting fact highlighted in today’s article is
that, the pattern of these large brown spots are unique to each
individual giraffe.Giraffes have distinctive orangish, rusty, or blackish coats which have whitish outlines which has the look of a patchwork cover. The pattern and the colour of the spots goes with the brownish habitat it lives in: the African grasslands. If it was a stitched patchwork cover, it would have taken a long time to get done, considering that the giraffe is the world’s tallest animal. Male giraffes are taller than females and grow to a height of around 20 feet. Its long legs and necks are the main features that make the giraffe hold the world record for being the tallest animal. A giraffe’s legs alone are taller than many humans, as it is about 6 feet (1.8 meters) high. These long legs also add to the giraffe’s speed on account of the length between the strides. A giraffe usually can achieve a speed of about 35 miles (56 kilometres) an hour over short distances -- and can cruise comfortably at 10 miles (16 kilometres) an hour over longer distances reveal zoologists who have studied the animal in depth.
Multi-purpose Neck
A long neck and height gives the giraffe many advantages. First of all, the long neck enables it to reach leaves of tall trees. Being a herbivore, the giraffe is on a totally vegetarian diet, and the long neck helps, there being no competition with other herbivorous that have no option, but to graze. Acacia trees are their favourite pick. Even the giraffe’s tongue is long! The 21-inch (53-centimeter) tongue helps them pluck tasty morsels from branches. The giraffe spends most of his time eating, and like cows, regurgitate food and chew it as cud. The giraffe is in fact the largest ruminant who can do this trick. It is said that a giraffe eats hundreds of pounds of leaves each week and must travel many miles to find sufficient food.
The giraffe’s height also gives it an added advantage. The large African Savannah is full of threats, but because of its long neck, the giraffe can observe a vast area to detect any impending danger giving it ample time to flee. The long neck is also used as a tool in battle, where young males ‘neck-fight’ to show dominance. Males establish social hierarchies by ‘necking’ which is a combat bout, where the neck is used as a weapon. Dominant males gain mating access to females, who bear the sole responsibility for raising the young. However, such contests are usually not dangerous and just end in a show of power. A fight usually ends when one animal submits and walks away. The giraffe has small “horns” or knobs on top its head that grow to about five inches. Both sexes have horns which are covered with skin. The horns of males are thicker and heavier and are used in fights between males. These knobs also act as a form of head gear in fights protecting from serious harm.
Nature is indeed wonderful and has balanced the gift of height of the giraffe, which is an advantage in finding food and in detecting danger at the same time, by making it vulnerable at drinking posture. The giraffe’s stature makes it very difficult and dangerous to drink at a water hole, as it has to spread its legs and bend down in an awkward position making it easy prey to predators like the lion. However, the giraffe can go without a drink for several days as they get most of their water needs from the luscious plants they eat.
Rude welcome to the world
Typically, this fascinating animal roams the open grasslands in small groups of about half a dozen. As mentioned earlier the male giraffe is larger than the female, with a male weighing around 1,600 kg and the female about 830 kg. The giraffe gives birth while standing. The young endure a rather harsh entry into the world by falling more than 5 feet (1.5 meters) to the ground at birth. The new born giraffe can stand on its legs within half an hour of birth and in ten hours will be seen running with the mother. Baby giraffes are born at an impressive height of six feet. It has been calculated that they can grow an inch a day and just about double their height in one year.
A giraffe can rest standing, but often lies down with its legs folded beneath. The neck is held vertical except during short periods of sleep, usually for about five minutes when the head is rested on the rump. When a giraffe walks it swings the two legs to the same side of the body at almost the same time. When galloping, the hind legs are brought forward together and placed outside the front legs. Maximum galloping speed is 31-37 mph.
Zoologists have categorized nine subspecies of giraffe that live in different parts of Africa, by difference in coat pattern and by the shape of horns . Although listed as low risk on the World Conservation Union’s (IUCN’s) Red List of Threatened Animals, several giraffe subspecies are rare, including the Kordofan giraffe (G. c. antiquorum) of Sudan and the Nigerian giraffe (G. c. peralta), which is now found only in Chad and is extinct even in Nigeria.
So what do you want..? Do you want to see the adventures of a cartoon giraffe that is showing at a theatre or do you want to see the real ones..? You can watch adventures of Melman by going to the Liberty Cinema or get a Madagascar DVD. But if you want to see the real ones - you definitely have to visit the Dehiwala Zoo..!
Giraffe Facts
n Giraffes do not have vocal chords unlike other animals. But researchers have found that they do have vocal chords, but can not make any sound. It communicates by waving its tail.
n Giraffes and humans have the same number of neck bones; both have 7 bones in their neck. The only difference is the giraffe’s bones are much longer.
n Who will win if a giraffe and a lion start fighting? Are you thinking that a lion will win? A lone lion won’t dare to start a fight against a giraffe. A giraffe can crush a lion with its long legs. Lions and giraffes do not relate well and stay away from each other.
n Giraffes walk differently from most other animals. It walks by stepping forward with both right legs and both left legs instead of alternating them.
n Giraffes have very long tongues which can be as long as 19 inches. The tip of its tongue is blue and black to prevent from sunburn.
n Giraffes have very large hearts, as it needs to pump very high blood pressure, and weighs around 26lbs.
n Giraffes are the tallest land animals on earth at the moment and grow to be more than 18 feet, in height, and have the longest tails. Giraffe calves are about 5 feet tall at birth.
n Giraffes need about 36 Kg of food each day to survive. It does not eat all the leaves of a tree at once. In some instances when a giraffe starts eating carnivorous ants that are symbiotic with some Acacia species attack, reducing the amount of time the giraffe can spend browsing on any one plant.
n The average life span of a giraffe is about 25 years.
n Giraffe’s body spots are similar to human finger prints in the sense they are unique to each individual animal.
n Giraffes’ tongues are almost 2 feet long.
n Giraffes spread their front legs, to drink water at ground level as their tall necks are shorter than their legs.
n Giraffes use their markings as a camouflage among trees.
n Giraffes’ mouth has a hard inner surface making it easy to eat thorny plants.
n Giraffes cannot cough.
Source: http://www.bestfunfacts. com/giraffes.html
Published on SundayTimes on 15.07.2012 http://www.lakbimanews.lk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=6128%3Avegan-giraffe-feared-even-by-the-mighty-lion&Itemid=56
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