Why Giraffes Have Long Necks

Morning Long Necks!

Alright so, everybody knows giraffes are these weird long-necked herbivores from Africa right?

But did you know that 10 million years ago they looked pretty different from today:

This thing is a Samotherium, an ancient giraffid that roamed the grasslands of Eurasia and Africa.

And, if you notice, they had one main difference from giraffes of today.

Wayyyy shorter necks.

Modern day giraffes have necks that are like 7-10 feet long.

But these ancient giraffes had necks just like 3 feet long.

So, what happened? Why did giraffes generate such long ass necks?

Enter this old bearded guy, Charles Darwin.

See, in the late 1830s, Charles here came up with an idea called natural selection.

Which basically stated that animals that are more adapted to their environment are more likely to survive, have sexy times and pass on their genes.

Knowing this, his theory for why giraffes have such long necks went a bit like this:

Imagine, it's 10 million years ago, you had these ancient short necked giraffes roaming about the place, feasting on the leaves of trees.

Now, out of all these short necked giraffes, some would have had longer necks than others due to natural variations in populations.

You know, just like how humans are all roughly the same height, but some are taller and some are shorter.

Here’s the thing, all these ancient giraffes were all competing to reach more food from trees.

This led to the ancient giraffes with longer necks being more likely to survive, have sexy times, and pass on their genes.

So gradually, over like millions of years, generation by generation, these ancient giraffes had babies with longer and longer necks.

Makes sense right?

Welp… turns out this is kinda wrong.

I mean, it's almost there, it's just lacking one major element.

More recent science states that the neck growth wasn’t as a result of natural selection to compete for food, but more a sexual selection…

Dubbed necks for sex. (Yes really)

Sexual selection actually happens quite a lot in nature. A common example is a peacock’s tail.

Yeah, it looks awesome, but it poses no practical purpose other than sexual attraction.

And this is believed to be the main driving factor for giraffe neck length.

This was based on a few observations.

• Number 1: During the dry season, when competition for food should be more intense, giraffes often browse low shrubs rather than tall trees.

• Number 2: Giraffes seem to feed faster and more often with their necks bent rather than stretched out, like this:

• Number 3: Most importantly, male giraffes use their long necks for something completely unrelated to feeding. Whacking other males competing for mates.

It is argued that this particular form of combat that giraffes engaged in was the main reason why giraffes necks got so long.

Basically, the longer the neck, the better the giraffe at whacking their opponent.

Thus, they are the one that gets the babe.

It's thought that it’s this competition for mates that, over millions of years, made giraffes grow longer and longer necks.

Stay Cute,
Reece, Henry & Dylan 🌈

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