Ancient animals with the most bizarre horns on their heads. Giraffes are born with horns, the only animal that is born with horns.

There are many animals that have horns. Horned animals can be both domestic and wild. The functions of horns are different. Some animals “shed” their antlers in winter and grow new ones every year. The size and weight of the horns of some animals are simply amazing.

Let's look at the most “horned” animals:

The waterbuck is a large and strong antelope: the height of adult males reaches 130 cm, weight - 250 kg. Only males have horns; they are heavy, widely spaced, fork-shaped, slightly curved forward and reach more than a meter in length. Waterbucks have horns playing important role during the rut. Before the start of the tournament, the fighters stand opposite each other with their front legs wide apart and their heads lowered to the ground. During the battle, the animals cross their horns, rest their foreheads and try to press down the enemy’s head.

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The mouflon is considered the smallest of the mountain sheep, but it holds the honor of being the progenitor of all breeds of domestic sheep. Male mouflons have large, triangular, spirally twisted horns that form only one circle; their surface is dotted with numerous wrinkles.

The Cretan ibex is found today only on Crete and neighboring coastal islets. The size of an adult animal reaches 1.2-1.6 m, its height at the shoulders is about 0.8 m, and its weight ranges from 15 to 40 kg. Kri-kri males have huge saber-shaped horns, reaching a length of 80 cm, and a long thick beard.

The Siberian mountain goat is a fairly large animal: its body length reaches 165 cm, weight - 130 kg. Females are much smaller than males, but they also have horns, albeit small ones. The horns of males are much more massive, strongly curved back and can exceed 1 m in length. mating season the males fight fiercely, and the blows of their horns can be heard quite far away. Sometimes fights end in the death of one of the opponents.

The Alpine ibex is a beautiful representative of the genus of mountain goats, which can only be seen in the Alps. The powerful horns of males can reach a length of more than 1 meter and weigh about fifteen kilograms. They play an important role during the rut, in November-January, when males, who usually live alone, join groups of females. At this time, serious tournament fights take place between the goats. The winning male lives in the harem until spring.

You can see annual rings on the horns of this goat. From them you can determine the age of the animal. Every year a new ring appears on the horn.

It is believed that horned and bezoar goats participated to varying degrees in the development of the domestic goat. The horns of the longest-horned domestic goat are 132 cm in length.

These bulls are called "inyambo" - a cow with very long horns. main feature Ankole-Watusi are amazing horns; their length can reach 3.7 meters. How longer than the horn, the wider they are at the base, and the more respect their owner is in the herd. The highest level of the hierarchy is the inclusion of the king of the tribe in the herd and the assignment of sacred status. For the Watussi themselves main value Their horns lie in their thermoregulatory properties. Their horns act as radiators in which the circulating blood is cooled and distributed throughout the body, lowering its temperature. This quality is life-saving in Ankole habitats, where temperatures can reach 50 degrees.

The longest-horned bull of the Watusi breed has a weight of each horn of about fifty kilograms and a length of more than ninety-two centimeters.

This species got its name because of the shape of the horns, which twist like a corkscrew or screw and reach a length of 1.5 m.

Bighorn sheep or bighorn sheep are common in the mountains of western North America from Canada to the California Peninsula. Male bighorns have very heavy and massive horns, their length is about 110 cm, and their weight is 14 kg (this is about the same as all the other bones of the body weigh in total). The horns of females are always well developed, but weaker than those of males; they have a semi-crescent shape and sharply diverge to the sides.

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In the section on the question Which animal is born with horns? given by the author Neurosis the best answer is The giraffe is the only animal in which both sexes are born with horns on their heads.
The miracle of the giraffe's birth bears the indelible stamp of intelligent design. A newborn is born falling from a height of one and a half meters, since the mother cannot squat on half-bent legs, and lying on the ground means inevitably becoming the prey of a lion or other predator. Moreover, the cub’s head, like that of other animals, is disproportionately large, which complicates childbirth. But the main thing is that this head is connected to a 70-kilogram body through a fragile long neck. And if a newborn falls head first, then when the body falls from above, the cub will inevitably break its neck; and if his body is forward, then he will still break his neck under the weight of the weight of the body, when it has already come out, but his head has not yet. However, there is a way out of this situation: a newborn giraffe has very narrow hips on the hind legs, and the neck is long enough so that the head runs along the body to the hips. Thus, the hind legs come out first, the newborn rests on them, his head is supported by the hips, and the neck, thanks to its extreme flexibility, remains intact.
Such a miracle becomes possible only with a combination of strictly defined structural features and precisely this length of the neck. A few minutes later the newborn is already standing in a graceful pose between the mother’s legs. In the four years from birth to maturity, the giraffe's neck grows from one-sixth to one-third of the animal's total height. Thanks to this feature, the giraffe quickly gains the ability to lean toward the water while standing on long legs. In the first year of life, a young giraffe feeds almost exclusively on its mother’s milk, and this is not difficult.
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Giraffes sleep at night, but only for a few minutes at a time; The total duration of deep sleep apparently does not exceed 20 minutes per night.

A sleeping giraffe lies with its neck bent so that its head rests on the lower part of its hind limb. In this case, the laying down process (first lowered onto the chest, then onto the stomach) takes 15-20 seconds. Sleep is often interrupted (sometimes up to eight times a night).

It turns out that their unbending necks bend perfectly. Scientists were able to trace this by sneaking up on the animals at night with devices that allowed them to see in the dark. Giraffes rest their head back on their rump, or rest their muzzle on the ground.

It is clear that 20 minutes is not enough for such giants, so they compensate for the lack of sleep with the help of a kind of half-nap during the day: they spend more time in an upright position and sleep standing up, and with eyes closed, sometimes placing their head between two branches to avoid falling, and strong neck muscles help them stay in this position without much strain.

So, these beautiful animals have effectively solved the issue of sleep and rest: they can do it both lying down and standing, and at the same time very economically in terms of time costs.

More Interesting Facts about giraffes:

The word "giraffe" comes from the Arabic zaraf and means "decorated"

The giraffe is the only animal that is born with horns.

Males reach a height of up to 5.5-6 m and weigh up to 900 kg

Giraffes can run fast and, in case of urgent need, reach a gallop speed of 55 km/h, that is, over short distances they can overtake racehorse. At the same time, they walk slowly, moving both right legs at the same time, then both left ones. The length of one giraffe step is 6-8 m.

Paleontologists recently unearthed an exotic relative of the giraffe in Spain - with saber fangs and three horns. The middle horn reminded scientists of Queen Amidala's hairstyle from " Star Wars"(The beast got its name in honor of her). Further in the article there is a list of fossil mammals with incredible fancy horns , whose portraits were created by the artist Lucas Lima(Lucas Lima).

Giraffe Xenokeryx amidalae

Two horny processes were located above his eyes, and a third, T-shaped, on the top of his head. The central horn is similar to Queen Amidala's hairstyle from Star Wars, which is why the animal was named Xenokeryx amidalae ("Amidala's strange-horned alien").

He lived in the Miocene era (15.5 million years ago) and belonged to a group of extinct horned ruminants, of which only okapi and giraffes have survived to this day.

Sivatherium

Of the ancient giraffes, they lasted the longest - their images are marked on frescoes that are only eight thousand years old. They lived from Africa to South Asia. They probably got their name in honor of Indian god Shiva.

The head of the Sivateria is compressed from the sides by two pairs of horns: the front ones are small, conical in shape, directed forward; the hind horns are massive, flat, branched, similar in shape to the horns of a modern elk. The horns, probably, like those of all giraffes, were covered with skin and hair.

Elasmotherium

The shaggy rhinoceros of Eurasia became extinct about 50 thousand years ago. Perhaps primitive people managed to paint it on the walls of Spanish caves. It weighed up to four tons and was a herd animal: whole herds of Elasmotherium grazed on the Siberian plains.

The animal had a massive protruding bony forehead: it is assumed that there was a powerful horn up to one and a half meters long on it. The horns themselves have not yet been found (apparently, they consisted of proteins, and not bone) - their presence is judged by indirect signs.

The bony growth on the forehead has numerous grooves and depressions - traces of the many blood vessels necessary to ensure intensive tissue activity that generates the production of keratin, which, in turn, forms a long keratin horn.

Horned gopher (Ceratogaulus)

The smallest horned mammal and the only horned rodent. He lived several million years ago on the Great Plains of North America and, most likely, in burrows (this is indicated by poor vision and powerful claws on paws similar to oars).

The large double horns of the rodent protruded from the bridge of the nose. Scientists are still arguing why the animal needed such strange adaptations - to dig the ground, attract females, or defend itself from predators. The location of the horns makes the first version unlikely, and their presence in animals of both sexes speaks in favor of a protective function.

Synthetoceras tricornatus

Real Cenozoic Triceratops! These animals roamed the plains of the wild American West in the late Miocene, and no less than the mustang deserve the honor of becoming its symbol: with a gun mounted on a “slingshot” on the face of the synthetoceras, one could easily shoot enemies.

However, in fact, this draft unicorn belonged to the family Protoceratidae - probable relatives of camels. It is unclear whether the appendages were covered with a cornea, but they were apparently not shed annually (as modern deer do).

Brontotherium

Huge, powerful omnivorous equids. Lived in North America and became extinct about 30 million years ago. They were only slightly larger in size than modern rhinoceroses. Brontotheriums had a relatively small head on a short powerful neck and close-set eyes.

On the nose of the brontothere there was a large bony process, the surface of which was covered with durable skin. Such a process, formed by overgrown nasal bones, was flat, like a shovel, and in representatives of some species it forked at the end.

Bramatherium

Another representative of the giraffe family, a relative of Sivatherium (only small). Lived in the Miocene-Pliocene in Asia, from India to Turkey. Bramateria bore some similarities to the okapi (Okapia johnstoni).

But, unlike the okapi, it had not two, but five horns on its head. In Sivatherium, large posterior ossicones are usually more developed, while in Bramateria, the anterior ones are more developed.

Apparently, such horns had a demonstration function, but they could also be used in fights between males. Individuals struck each other with the help of the massive base of the ossicones and the rear pair directed to the sides.

Arsinoitherium zitteli

By appearance the beast resembled a rhinoceros, although in terms of the structure of the skeleton and limbs it was closer to an elephant. Two large bone horns on the muzzle were not located one after the other, like a rhinoceros, but side by side. Apparently, they were covered with a horny sheath of keratin, like modern cows.

The horns were not intended for battle, as they were hollow inside. It is believed that they were used to create loud trumpet sounds so that males could use them to attract females.

Arsinotherium is the only family in the extinct order of embryotopods. This is a very unusual group of animals of unknown origin, with no descendants. Remains of Arsinoitherium zitteli are found only in Oligocene sediments of the Fayum Basin in Egypt.

Bighorn deer (Megaloceros)

The well-known big-horned deer (Megaloceros) is practically a contemporary of humans: it survived until the end of the last ice age.

It was distinguished by its huge (up to 5.2 meters in span) horns, greatly expanded at the top in the shape of a spade with several branches. Apparently he lived in meadows, since a male with such horns would not be able to move in the forest.

Samotherium

One of the oldest giraffes lived from 10 to 5 million years ago (Miocene).

It was a large animal (height at the withers more than two meters, length about three meters), living in tall grass savannas and valley forests from Western Europe to China and North Africa. The first fossil remains were found on the island of Samos in the Aegean Sea (hence the name).