[VIDEO] Poachers Killed 2 Extremely Rare White Giraffes Inside A Wildlife Sanctuary
Only one white giraffe is now left alive in the world.
By Sadho Ram — 11 Mar 2020, 01:14 PM
Poachers have killed two extremely rare white giraffes at Ishaqbini Hirola Community Conservancy in Garissa County, eastern Kenya.
One of them — a female giraffe — was the only living white giraffe.
According to rangers at the Ishaqbini Hirola Conservancy on Tuesday, 11 March, they found remains of the two stunning white giraffes that lived inside the Kenyan wildlife sanctuary.
In a statement, the Ishaqbini Hirola Community Conservancy said that the bodies of the two giraffes were found "in a skeletal state after being killed by armed poachers", reported The Guardian.
One of them was a female giraffe and her male calf who she had given birth to in 2017.
The mother giraffe along with her calf was first spotted in 2017 when they were captured in a video. They lived in an unfenced conservancy.
The giraffes' white appearance is believed to be due to a rare condition called leucism, which causes skin cells to have no pigmentation, according to experts quoted in a 2017 report by ABC News.
Back then, the report quoted the rangers at the Hirola Conservation Program saying that while the calf's skin had a faded pattern that was still visible, the mother giraffe was completely white.
Now, only one male white giraffe is left alive in the world
It is thought to be the only remaining bull in the world, said Mohammed Ahmednoor, manager of the reserve in Garissa County, Kenya, in a news release yesterday.
According to the manager, the two killed giraffes were last spotted more than three months ago.
"This is a very sad day for the community of Ijara and Kenya as a whole. We are the only community in the world who are custodians of the white giraffe," Ahmednoor said in the statement.
"Its killing is a blow to the tremendous steps taken by the community to conserve rare and unique species and a wake-up call for continued support to conservation efforts.
"This is a long-term loss given that genetics studies and research, which were significant investment into the area by researchers, has now gone down the drain," he added.
BBC reported that the poachers who killed the two giraffes have not yet been identified.
