We all know that zebras have stripes. Maybe you’ve also heard the story of how the leopard got his spots. And who doesn’t love the black blotches of cheetah print? These bedecked creatures strut the African continent. A head above all of them is, of course, the giraffe, whose coat is covered in distinctive brown splotches. Well, usually.
In 2023, two newborns defied our expectations: born in a Tennessee zoo and in the wild in Namibia, these giraffes possess the typical long necks, gangly legs, big, dark eyes—and totally plain, tan coats.
Can scientists spot the cause of the spotless babies? To do so, they may have to consider what we already know about giraffes’ beautiful patterns. For instance, a giraffe’s coat is like a fingerprint: each one is unique, and they never change. This isn’t to say that the coat patterns are random. The type of spot indicates the species, or subspecies—say, the polygons of the reticulated giraffe, or the Masai giraffe’s spikey inkblots. One study further suggests that calves genetically inherit certain traits, such as roundness of spots, from their mother.
This leads scientists to suspect that the spotless giraffes derive their coats from a genetic mutation, and they’re hoping to get detailed genetic analysis. After all, the only other unadorned giraffe was born in a Japanese zoo fifty years ago—meaning there’s a short supply of subjects to study. In the meantime, we’ll have to keep our eyes peeled for any further unmarked coats; despite fewer than 120,000 of them left in the wild, giraffes tower high in our imagination, and we still have much to learn.
Further Reading
- Relationships between male giraffes’ colour, age and sociability, Animal Behaviour, vol. 157, November 2019
- Seeing spots: quantifying mother-offspring similarity and assessing fitness consequences of coat pattern traits in a wild population of giraffes (Giraffa camelopardalis)
- Color of Giraffes’ Spots Reflects Social Status, Not Age, Smithsonian Magazine
- Another spotless giraffe has been discovered — this time, on a reserve in Namibia, NPR, September 12, 2023
- World’s rarest giraffe born without spots at Tennessee zoo, LiveScience, August 23, 2023
