Gemina, the giraffe with a crooked neck and one of the most beloved animals at the Santa Barbara Zoo, was euthanized yesterday at the age of 21."We observed a decline in her appetite over the past two weeks and she had stopped eating all together," said the zoo's director of animal programs and conservation. "Her declining condition appeared to affect her quality of life. We did everything we could but the time came when we had to make the humane decision."
Her illness was not believed related to her neck condition.
The giraffe was born July 16, 1986, at the San Diego Wild Animal Park and was brought to Santa Barbara when she was about a year old. She was around 3 when she began to develop a crooked neck that eventually bent sharply and made it appear that she had swallowed a hockey stick. Although her neck was X-rayed, the cause of the condition was never conclusively found. It did not affect her eating and she was treated normally by other giraffes, the zoo said.
I never went to the zoo while I lived in Santa Barbara, but I still knew how cool this giraffe was.
2 comments:
Gemina, we'll miss you.
We WILL! Aw, i'm getting a little misty eyed. I saw her twice at least. She was a freak. Giraffes are already freaky, but with the 90 degree angle in her neck, she was a superfreak.
Apparently, a monkey that lived in the visible backyard of a home near our local convenience store in Bakersfield has died at the age of 43. The ape was a bit of a fun fixture in our corner of Bako. That's two for me, what's the 3rd animal to die?
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