Life and death go hand in hand in the bush

The giraffe is the national symbol of Tanzania. 

The skyscraper-like-animal moves very elegantly and radiates a benevolent calmness. It is a social animal with tight family bonds and a strong community life. Tanzania chose the Giraffe as its national animal to represent these qualities.

One day at camp I was told by my team member to grap my camera. Malaki seemed to be in a hurry to go somewhere. He told me that our guide discovered a dead giraffe close to the camp. It was my task to take pictures of it and to notify the rangers. I quickly followed his instructions and in a bit we drove out in the vehicle to look for the corpse. 

In the bush there are no streets nor signs to be used for orientation. This makes it challenging to describe a certain place. We drove around for about half an hour and followed the tracks of the other vehicle. The search was of no use. Luckily, the mobile phones had reception and we could communicate with Michael to locate his finding. Once Michael and his two guest arrived, we directly went to the corpse. In case you have a weak stomach, try to skip the following photographs. 

From observing this picture one might get the idea that the giraffe was killed for its meat. The straight cutting marks proof that someone was using a sharp tool to cut the skin. Since it just happened the previous night, the smell was still bearable. Once the rangers from the Wildlife Management Area arrived, their trained eye immediately noticed the lack of any hunting injury. There was no blood coming out from wounds caused by a spear or a gun. After few minutes of observation, the ranger concluded that the giraffe died due to an unhappy circumstance. It suffered from an eye infection causing it to faint. While dropping down to the ground, it fell unfortunately and broke its neck. This accident killed it along with the baby it was carrying with it. Shortly after its death Maasai happened to be around it. They saw the dead corpse and cut of some slices of meat. 

A giraffe with its child in the Amboseli ecosystem close to Shu'mata Camp