Baby Giraffe Killed And Eaten By Lions Two Hours After Being Born

Life can be a beautiful thing. But it can also be fucking shit and unfair.

Somewhere, there is 105-year-old in a hot tub, sipping a glass of bubbly and reflecting on a long life of leisure. Elsewhere, a baby giraffe is being eaten alive by two massive lions, having not even known what the world was a couple of hours previously.

Claire Radloff, from East London, filmed the brutally brief circle of life while on safari in Shamwari Private Game Reserve, South Africa, with ranger Kevin Buys.

The footage was captured on 12 October and shows the spindly newborn struggling to its feet, staggering from side to side and falling over, with the mother stood by their side. Within a couple of hours, the baby had mastered the art of standing and taken its first steps.

Caters

However, a large male lion spotted the vulnerable giraffe and can be seen in the video stalking its prey in typically menacing fashion. Choosing its moment, the lion makes a quick dart and pounces on the baby, securing presumably the easiest catch of its life. A female lion then emerges from the bushes to join the feed.

Claire said the giraffe's life was only around two hours and 20 minutes long.

She said: "I have never experienced anything like this before.

"It was such an incredibly unique and amazing sighting to witness the circle of life unfold in the blink of an eye.

"Kelvin and I decided to stick around to see how long it would take for the baby to take its first steps as we were rooting for the little one.

"The entire sighting from birth to death lasted around two hours and 20 minutes."

That is such a shit hand.

The question has to be asked - where was the mother?

If a child is left to fall into a lion enclosure at a zoo, the first question is always, 'where were the parents?'.

The mother giraffe in question here was nowhere to be seen within two hours of her baby's birth; she literally threw her baby to the lions. Luckily for the mum, in the wild there is no such thing as a national security number or criminal neglect; it's the law of the jungle/African plains.

Admittedly, most parents don't have to immediately defend their newborns from lions, but I think we'd all like to think we'd sacrifice ourselves in defence of our babba.

Mummy giraffe is now going to live with the guilt of her cowardice resting on her shoulders/neck for the rest of her days.

Topics: Wildlife, Lion, Nature

Jake Massey

Jake Massey is a journalist at LADbible. He graduated from Newcastle University, where he learnt a bit about media and a lot about living without heating. After spending a few years in Australia and New Zealand, Jake secured a role at an obscure radio station in Norwich, inadvertently becoming a real-life Alan Partridge in the process. From there, Jake became a reporter at the Eastern Daily Press. Jake enjoys playing football, listening to music and writing about himself in the third person.

@jakesmassey