Giraffe Center (Nairobi, Kenya)

Nairobi has the wonderful Giraffe Center (near the Karen Gixen museum), where you can learn about and feed giraffes. The center has been protecting and breeding the rare Rothschild giraffe.

You are given half a coconut shell filled with little pellets that are made of grass and grass with molasses. Then you can feed them to the giraffes. The staff will demonstrate how to do this safely.

The giraffes we fed were very gentle (but persistent) in getting to all the food we had.  People can go up the line of giraffes (held back by a fence) and feed them by the pellet one at a time or in small handfuls they slurp up from your palm with their long tongues.  The main thing I learned during this activity is that giraffe saliva is slimy (all the better to pick things up with their tongues) and you will be very grateful for the sink that's there.

There is also  small museum where you can hear a discussion about the different kinds of giraffe in Africa, as well as the status of their efforts in supporting the Rothschild populations.  You may get a chance to see how heavy giraffe bones are (they are solid bone, not like our bones).  

The process of releasing the giraffes bred here takes a couple year.  First they have to learn to eat leaves rather than the pellets they get in the Center.  Then once a group of 3 or 4 are ready, they release them together as a pack so they are more safe in their nevw environemtn

One fact that really impressed us was that giraffes can be pregnant anywhere from 12 to 18 months.  This is to time their offspring's birth to the rainy season.