A 5-year-old giraffe from the Denver Zoo will temporarily move south to the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo in Colorado Springs to support conservation efforts, zoo officials announced Friday.
Jasiri, a reticulated giraffe at the Denver Zoo, will spend a few months at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo for those breeding efforts, according to the organization.
“Reticulated giraffes are classified as Endangered by the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species,” Denver zoo officials wrote on social media. “We’re proud to play a role in supporting this incredible species through collaborative conservation efforts like the (Species Survival Plan).”
Zoo officials did not specify how long Jasiri would stay at Cheyenne Mountain Zoo, but said he is expected to return to Denver later this year.
Species Survival Plans aim to ensure “a genetically diverse, demographically varied, and biologically sound population” at accredited zoos, according to the AZA. Program officials monitor populations and carefully match animals across AZA-accredited zoos for breeding.
A giraffe named Benito started a 50-hour road trip Monday to leave behind the cold and loneliness of Mexico’s northern border city of Ciudad Juarez to find warmth — and maybe a mate — in his new home 2,000 kilometers (1,200 miles) to the south.
A campaign by animal rights activists won the four-year-old giraffe a transfer to an animal park in Puebla state in central Mexico, where he will join a group of resident giraffes and enjoy a more suitable climate.
It has been a long and lonesome road for Benito. Jealousy forced him to leave his home at a zoo in the Pacific coast state of Sinaloa; he was taken last year to a city-run park in Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas to lead a life alone.
With temperatures in Ciudad Juarez reaching as low as 39 degrees F (4 degrees C) Monday, Benito set off in a crate strapped to the back of a flat-bed truck. He is a tall load, about 16 feet (meters) high, and the roof of his crate can be lowered to pass under bridges.
AP Photo
A truck carrying Benito the giraffe is escorted by a convoy of vehicles with officers from the Federal Attorney for Environmental Protection and the National Guard in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Sunday, Jan. 21, 2024. After a campaign by environmentalists, Benito left Mexico’s northern border and its extreme weather conditions Sunday night and headed for a conservation park in central Mexico, where the climate is more akin to his natural habitat and already a home to other giraffes. (AP Photo/Christian Chavez)
The animal’s head sticks up through the top of the big wooden and metal box, but a frame allows a tarp to cover over Benito and insulate him from the cold, wind and rain as well as from noise and the sight of landscape speeding by.
Residents gathered to say goodbye late Sunday in Ciudad Juarez as a crane lifted the container holding the giraffe onto the truck in preparation for the journey. “We love you, Benito,” some of them shouted.
“We’re a little sad that he’s leaving. but it also gives us great pleasure … The weather conditions are not suitable for him,” said Flor Ortega, a 23-year-old who said she had spent her entire life visiting Modesto, another giraffe who was at the zoo for two decades before dying in 2022. Benito arrived last May.
Benito is being transported across Mexico to Africam Safari park in central Puebla state where the low temperatures are about 20 degrees F warmer than in Ciudad Juarez.
More importantly, Benito may finally find a mate: There will be three female giraffes at his new home.
Environmental groups had voiced strong complaints about conditions faced by Benito at the city-run Central Park zoo in Ciudad Juarez, where weather in the summer is brutally hot and temperatures plunge during the winter.
Benito originally came from a zoo in the much more temperate climate of Sinaloa, a state on Mexico’s northern Pacific coast. Benito couldn’t stay with the two other giraffes there because they were a couple, and zookeepers feared the male would become territorial and attack the younger Benito.
So he was donated to Ciudad Juarez. In the summer there, he had little shade in his half-acre (0.2 hectare) enclosure; photos showed him crouching to fit under a small, circular shade canopy in the summer. In the winter, ice sometimes formed in the enclosure’s pond. There were few trees for him to munch on.
At the Africam Safari park, the giraffes live in a much larger space that more closely resembles their natural habitat. Visitors travel through the park in all-terrain vehicles to observe animals as if they were on safari.
The container specially designed to transport Benito is more than five meters high (16.5 feet). The giraffe was allowed to become familiar with it during the weekend, said Frank Carlos Camacho, the director of the Africam Safari park.
In a video update posted Monday from the cab of the truck about ten hours into the trip, Camacho said “up to now everything is going perfectly … the giraffe is doing very well.”
Inside the container is straw, alfalfa, water and vegetables, and electronic equipment monitors the temperature and even allows technicians to talk to the animal.
Outside, Benito is being escorted by a convoy of police, environmental officials and the National Guard.
At his new home, it will be almost like life will begin again for him, Camacho said. “He’s ready to be a giraffe,” he said. “He will reproduce soon, and contribute to the conservation of this wonderful species.”
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Associated Press writer Maria Verza in Mexico City contributed to this report.
A zoo in Tennessee says it has welcomed a rare giraffe that does not have any spots, with experts confirming she may be the only solid-colored reticulated giraffe on the planet. What do you think?
“Finally, a tasteful giraffe.”
Thomas Overton • Backyard Excavator
New Texas Law Requires Schools To Display Image Of God Hung Like A Horse In Every Classroom
“No spots just means it’s not ripe yet.”
Carolynn Tyrik • Freelance Critic
“Well, euthanasia will solve that little mistake.”
A zoo in Tennessee says it has welcomed a rare giraffe that does not have any spots. The spotless giraffe was born at Bright’s Zoo in Limestone, Tennessee, on July 31 and the zoo says experts believe she is the only solid-colored reticulated giraffe on the planet.
On Sunday, the zoo announced a naming contest for the baby giraffe, which visitors can now see at the zoo.
In an email to CBS News, the zoo’s director David Bright said the last recorded spotless giraffe was in 1972 in Tokyo. That giraffe, named Toshiko, was born at Ueno Zoo, according to archival photos.
A Tennessee zoo says it has welcomed a rare spotless giraffe. The zoo has opened a naming contest for the baby, which was born in late July.
Brights Zoo
Reticulated giraffes are a species of giraffes with brown and orange spots. They are native to Africa and in 2018 were listed as endangered, according to the Giraffe Conservation Foundation.
The zoo is hoping the headline-making giraffe will bring attention to the challenges the species faces in the wild, the zoo said in a press release.
“The international coverage of our patternless baby giraffe has created a much-needed spotlight on giraffe conservation,” said Tony Bright, founder of Bright’s Zoo. “Wild populations are silently slipping into extinction, with 40% of the wild giraffe population lost in just the last 3 decades.”
On Monday, the zoo said it had narrowed down the naming contest list to four choices: Kipekee, which means unique; Firyali, which means unusual or extraordinary; Shakiri, which means “she is most beautiful”; and Jamella, which means “one of great beauty.”
In 2020, a family of three rare white giraffes was spotted in Kenya. The all-white giraffes had leucism, which causes the loss of pigmentation, creating white skin.
After two of the giraffes were killed by poachers, a conservation group fitted the remaining giraffe with a GPS monitor to trace its movements and hopefully keep poachers away.
CBS News has reached out to the Giraffe Conservation Foundation and other experts for more information on the spotless giraffe.
