Kuva: Miroslav Duchacek, Wikipedia.
Joel Kontinen
Giraffes' necks
can be up to 3 meter (10 feet) long, allowing the animals to reach leaves
high up in trees. But they didn't always have this impressive feature.
This is what Live
Science said: “Discokeryx xiezhi is a sheep-size, ancient relative of
modern day giraffes that lived around 17 million years ago during the early
Miocene epoch (23 million to 5.3 million years ago). It
had a stumpy neck and a disk-shaped, thick skull.
”Scientists in
2022 proposed that the thick skulls of D. xiezhi evolved to withstand
massive blows to the head during fights between males. Those
same bouts fueled the growth of their necks to aid in fighting. This is called
the "necks for sex" hypothesis and suggests competition led to longer
necks developing. Males who won fights more often passed these genes onto their
offspring than did the losers, eventually leading to the giraffes we see today.”
Source:
How 10 animals evolved their iconic
features | Live Science 6 January.
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