Giraffes!

 Oh, my, but we did see a whole lot of giraffes while on safari.  In fact, we saw giraffes right in Nairobi, at the Giraffe Center.  We also saw giraffes on our drive from the Nairobi airport to our hotel.  There is a national park in Nairobi!  It's the only city in the world with a national park attached.  (Unless I was ill informed....)

Nonie getting ready to feed a giraffe at the Giraffe Center, Nairobi

We saw mostly G. c. tippelskirchi, known as Maasai giraffes, which are found in Kenya and Tanzania.  We also saw some G. c. reticulata, which are commonly called reticulated giraffe.  To be honest, I couldn't tell one subspecies from another!

I think giraffe hide patterns are beautiful.  The shading is subtle but elegant.  Why don't you see more (faux!) giraffe hide designs in fashion and home furnishings?

Giraffes can not ever lie down.  If they do, they die.  It has to do with blood flow and neck length and heart pressure.  It causes a brain hemorrhage.  They do kneel down, to sleep or eat from short shrubs, but they never lie down.  This does make a rather rude introduction to the world for new born giraffes as they fall about four feet to the ground.

Giraffes are beautiful just standing still, but to see one galloping through the tall grass is stunning.  They are both elegant and graceful, and gangly and odd, all at the same time.

I have become very fond of giraffes.  They are intriguing and interesting and they have beautiful eyes.

Elephants and a Tale of Billy the Bully

Everywhere we went in the Kenya and Tanzania reserves and parks we were lucky enough to see elephants.  We saw single males off by themselves and we saw big groups of females with their offspring.

An elephant in the wild is truly magnificent.  They are graceful, surprisingly so, and quiet.  They can be very expressive.  By watching an elephant's ears you can judge their mood.  (Reminded me of how I could always tell my cat's mood by his ears....same thing with elephants, especially if you are an experienced elephant observer.)

Many elephant herds move back and forth long distances each day.  In the Ngorongoro the herds of females and young would spend the day down in the crater, near the watering holes and the long, tasty grass and then return to the hillsides in the evenings.  Back and forth, each day.

The female elephants will often put themselves between a safari vehicle and their young, protecting them from the interlopers.  This is the same behavior they use with any threat, real or perceived, to their babies.

And this brings us to the tale of Billy the Bully, a young male elephant who adores playing, bullying and beating up his long-suffering older sister......

Billy was first spotted as he chased this older juvenile female into and out of a stand of shrubs.  Crashing and running, they "galloped" around and around, in and out of the shrubs.  Billy was always the aggressor.

When he caught up to his sister, he'd poke her in the back end with his tusks and head butt her bottom.

Then he would smack her repeatedly with is truck.  He'd smack her side and then smack her ears.    She would be making an effort to avoid him, but she never turned on him or used her larger size to put an end to this bullying behavior.

Billy finally ended up just pulling her tail.  Our driver was trying to tell us that he was just holding onto her tail to "follow" along, but he was truly pulling on it.  It was just another way to be a bully!

He was really good at being the obnoxious little brother.