A giraffe is the tallest living animal on Earth, with long legs and an incredibly long neck that can reach up to six feet. Giraffes use their height to eat leaves from the tops of acacia trees in Africa, where most other animals can't reach. Their necks contain the same number of bones as yours (seven), but each bone is much, much longer.

These gentle giants have distinctive spotted coats, with each giraffe's pattern as unique as a human fingerprint. They also have unusual blue-black tongues that can stretch 18 inches long to wrap around branches and strip off leaves. Despite their size (males can grow over 18 feet tall and weigh 3,000 pounds), giraffes move gracefully and can run up to 35 miles per hour when needed.

Baby giraffes, called calves, experience quite a dramatic entrance to the world: they drop about six feet to the ground when born, then stand up and start walking within an hour. In the wild, giraffes live in loose groups across African savannas, though their populations have declined significantly in recent decades because of habitat loss.