Giraffes, Topeka Zoo Live Cam

Giraffes graze under trees in a paddock at Topeka Zoo, in the capital of Kansas, in front of the camera. A pond and a treeline close the view.

A giraffe has seven neck vertebrae, the same number as a human, each of them the length of a forearm. The heart has to push blood two metres uphill, and a system of valves keeps the animal from blacking out when it lifts its head from drinking.

The zoo sits inside a large city park and keeps an indoor rainforest under glass, which is what most people come for in a Kansas winter. Giraffe numbers in the wild have fallen by about a third in thirty years.