This “extremely rare phenomenon”, according to the Minister of Wildlife, took place in the Nairobi National Park, just 7 km from the heart of the capital.
Le Monde
Two Girafons Masaï were born in Nairobi National Park after fifteen months of gestation, a rare event which Minister Kenyan de la fauna, Najib Balala, welcomed on Tuesday July 19. “It is an extremely rare phenomenon,” he commented on Twitter, a key photo showing the majestic giraffe Masai watching over his two long-stolen offspring.
One of the Maasai Giraffes in Nairobi National Park has given birth to a set of twins. This is an extremely rare oc… https://t.co/u8ja9wbxws
Giraffes appear in the category of “vulnerable” animals, according to the global red list of endangered species established in 2016 by the International Union for Nature Conservation (IUCN), which lists among others “the growth of the human population “, illegal hunting or the expansion of agriculture and mining operations as factors” pushing the species towards extinction “. There are only 117,000 giraffes in the wild in the wild in the world, according to the Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF). According to this NGO, their number has dropped 30 % over the past thirty years in Africa. Kenya houses three subspecies of these giants: the masai giraffes, reticulated and rothschild.
on foot in less than an hour
Located just 7 km from the heart of the capital and its skyscrapers, the Nairobi park – the oldest in East Africa – attracts many tourists for the richness of its fauna, between lions, leopards and rhinos. Vast 117 km 2
sup>, it was drawn by the British settlers in the 1940s. The reserve resists the dazzling growth of the capital and the infrastructures, factories and more or less wild housing which accompany.
Giraffes have one of the longest gestation periods (fifteen months) among mammals. They put back standing, which means that their little ones, larger than an average adult man, fall just under two meters from the ground. This surprising introduction to life sets them up in less than an hour. Only a handful of births of twin girafons have been documented worldwide, most often without survival. At freedom, giraffes can live up to 25 years, while in captivity their longevity can stretch up to 35 years.