No laughing matter

WE can probably recall reading or reciting the age-old rhyme as children, or even to children: “Oh, Mr Giraffe you make me laugh!” Perhaps you may have forgotten it, not unlike conservationists worldwide who have overlooked this giant ungulate and ruminant.

While there are still giraffes in regional zoos such as in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore, do take your children and grandchildren along to see these amazing African mammals. Their numbers have tragically been slowly and quietly whittled away.

A century ago, thousands of giraffes roamed freely across the West African savannah lands, but a century in human history is but the blink of an eye, as in 1996 only 50 giraffes were recorded in Niger.

Unlike other countries, Niger did not turn a blind eye to animal destruction and through a programme of vigilant protection and conservation, there are now 400 giraffes in that country.

New research on the giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis) population in Africa has revealed that since 1999, giraffe numbers have fallen by 40 per cent. There were 140,000 giraffes in 1999; last year it was estimated that there were fewer than 80,000.

This no laughing matter, for whilst only two of the nine species of giraffe are classified as endangered on the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a total audit planned for this year could well reveal that the seven others species will be added to the endangered category.

Considerable concern, remarkable fundraising and governmental support have been allocated to the conservation of elephants, but giraffes have been sadly overlooked.

This is likely because of the giraffe’s tendency to appear before humans in smaller groups and then to gracefully and quietly disappear amongst the scrubland and its acacia trees.

Interestingly, on the African savannah quite distinct ‘waistlines’ are created in the foliage of trees at different heights, with the tallest waistline in the upper foliage nibbled out by giraffes. These animals have always fascinated me ever since I went on a school trip in the late 1950s to see them at a zoo.

More recently I have visited national parks and national game reserves in Kenya to photograph these majestic mammals at close range and even to feed them by hand and then see them nonchalantly stride away.

To visit the giraffe house and compound at Whipsnade Zoo, in the United Kingdom with my grandchildren was equally pleasurable, especially to see a newborn giraffe.

Inevitably each newborn giraffe, wherever its location in zoos worldwide, is photographed and makes national news.

Unless we see all zoos with a full development plan to return these animals to their natural habitats in the wild, we will only see giraffes in zoos and not on the African savannah lands. More rehabilitation centres for imported zoo giraffes need to be established in many African countries.

What have we, as humans, done to neglect the conservation of such fascinating mammals?

Gradually we have eaten into their domains through land clearance, cattle farming and plantation developments.

Prolonged armed conflict in Somalia has decimated the Reticulated giraffe species as soldiers have sought a source of food.

Bush meat hunting with the use of cruel wire snares is common as giraffe meat is highly palatable.

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, ivory poachers kill giraffes to survive whilst they are on killing treks after elephants for the illegal ivory trade to China and Vietnam.

Giraffes are also targeted by lions, leopards, spotted hyenas and wild dogs.

It is in East Africa that the largest giraffe numbers survive with approximately 30,000 Masai giraffes, 6,500 Reticulated giraffes but sadly only 1,100 Rothchild’s giraffes. The South African variety numbers 25,000 and the Angolan 20,000.

Undoubtedly the greatest threats in Africa are in the Sahel region of West Africa, where climatic change combined with inevitable change of land use have prompted a progressive southern shift of more arid conditions.

This has not only threatened natural vegetation and farming but also increased the local populace’s need to survive by hunting wild animals.

Many myths also abound of the medicinal properties of giraffe bones and marrow in tribal medicine.

Educational programmes in conservation need to be developed in the remoter rural schools so that the pupils’ learning can be ‘trickled-up’ to their parents and tribal elders.

It is a starting point for all villagers to learn that giraffes do not threaten humans and that humans threaten these ungulates’ and ruminants’ very existence. Tribal attitudes towards wildlife can be changed.

Looking at the declining giraffe population from another angle, the promotion of tourism through safari expeditions to shoot giraffes with cameras and not guns would boost local economies by the trickle-down effect to villagers.

The creation of more national parks in every African country seems idealistic but to be realistic the income generated by tourists is the only way that giraffes and other animal species may survive.

Dr Julian Fennessy, the world’s only full-time giraffe conservationist and director of the Giraffe Conservation Foundation, bluntly stated that these ungulates are not given enough attention or protection by governmental and conservation groups.

With the average lifespan of a giraffe estimated at 33 years, we as humans should be able to live another 33 years and beyond … God willing.

If in the next three decades we can save Mr and Mrs and baby giraffe in their natural environment, we may genuinely laugh in the realms of the nursery rhyme. If we can’t, then every dead giraffe will make us weep.

For further interesting reading and to know more about giraffes go to www.giraffeconservation.org.