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Interesting Giraffe Facts for Kids

Giraffes, the tallest land mammals on the planet. Characterized by its long legs, long neck, and distinctive spotted pattern, many people once believed the giraffe was a cross between a leopard and a camel. This is one of many amazing facts about our long-neck friends and this is Animal Facts. Hi, I’m Leroy. If you love animals like we do, hit that subscribe button. Let’s Get Started.

10. Spending most of the day eating, a full-grown giraffe consumes over 100 lbs. or 45 kilograms of leaves and twigs each day. Giraffes live primarily in savanna areas in the sub-Saharan region of Africa. Savannas are characterized as grasslands with few trees, so every little advantage helps. Their extreme height allows them to eat leaves and shoots located much higher than most other animals can reach. Giraffe tongues are huge! They are up to 17 inches or 45cm long and are specially adapted to allow giraffes to forage on trees that other animals would avoid, such as acacias, which are very thorny.

9. When giraffes walk, they move both legs on one side of their body and then both legs on the other side; this pacing gait is unique to giraffes and camels. A common explanation for their unusual gaits is that the gait prevents fore and hind feet from getting in each other’s way. However, they run in a similar style to other mammals, swinging their rear legs and front legs in unison. They can run as fast as 35 miles an hour over short distances, or cruise at 10 mph over longer distances.

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8. Giraffes only spend between 10 minutes and two hours sleeping per day. They have one of the shortest sleep requirements of any mammal. In general, they sleep with their feet tucked under them and their head resting on their hindquarters, but they can also sleep for short periods of time standing up.

7. Young giraffes hang out in nursery groups until they are around 5 months old, resting and playing together while their mothers forage in the distance. Baby Giraffes can stand within half an hour and after only 10 hours can actually run alongside their family.

6. Giraffes are sociable, peaceful animals which rarely fight. Males do perform a behavior called necking where they will hit necks; howe, er these encounters rarely last more than a couple of minutes and seldom result in injury. The knobs on their heads, called ossicones, are used to protect the head when males playfully fight.

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5. There is only one species of giraffe. The recognized subspecies include reticulated, Nubian, Uganda or Baringo, Masai, Angolan, and southern. The different kinds can be recognized by their spots and also by where they live in Africa. Masai giraffes, from Kenya, have spots that look like oak leaves. Other kinds have a square-shaped pattern that looks like the giraffe is covered by a net. Some zoologists think that the giraffe’s pattern is for camouflage.

4. A giraffe’s neck is too short to reach the ground. As a result, it has to awkwardly spread its front legs or kneel to reach the ground for a drink of water.

3. Luckily, Giraffes only need to drink once every few days. Most of their water comes from all the plants they eat.

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2. Whilst it was once thought that giraffes did not make any sounds, this is now known to be untrue, as giraffes bellow, snort, hiss and make flute-like sounds, as well as low pitch noises beyond the range of human hearing.

1. A giraffe’s spots are much like human fingerprints. No two individual giraffes have exactly the same pattern.

Well, there ya have it, a tall list of giraffe facts. Did we reach high enough? Let us know in the comments below.IfF you like this list, hit that like button and make sure to subscribe, for more fun fauna facts. If you’d like to help us create more lists, consider becoming a patron on Patreon and as always, catch ya next time.