Youtubers eagerly await for April the giraffe to bloom
TAIL held aside? Check. Udders filled? Check. Swelling backside? Check.
April the giraffe shows every sign she’ll soon deliver her calf, to the delight of an enthralled Youtube audience.
“April is eating, eating, eating and eating,” Jordan Patch, owner of Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, New York, said on Tuesday afternoon.
“We sit and wait. The signs suggest it’s just a matter of when,” he said.
Since Patch announced in a March 6 Facebook post that the delivery was imminent, tens of thousands of fans tuned into April’s livestream.
It’s a replay of 2017, when April drew more than 232 million Youtube live views in the weeks leading up to the birth of Tajiri, her fifth calf.
This time Patch doesn’t expect the suspense to stretch out so long.
“If we hit April 1 I’ll be absolutely shocked.”
When he started livestreaming April’s pregnancy in 2017, Patch never expected to draw worldwide attention to his small zoo, which is 209km north-west of New York City.
“We were helping our local fans tune in,” Patch said. “Now we are educating the world.”
At any given moment 50 000 to 60 000 people are watching the livestream and discussing giraffes, Patch said.
That “is bringing awareness to the cause, which is conservation”.
Giraffe numbers in Africa have plunged by 40% over the past 30 years, leaving fewer than 100 000 today, according to the nonprofit Giraffe Conservation Foundation.
Patch bristles at suggestions the giraffe cam is motivated by money.
“The event is free to the world,” he said. “No one has to pay a cent.
“But people are so compelled and moved by the live birth that they want to support what’s happening,” Patch said. | AP