Inspired by Gentle Giants – Giraffes – Biomimicry for Young Children

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Cool Giraffe Neck Twister Game

Giraffe Jaws

Giraffe Long Tongue Robot

Come up with an idea for a giraffe invention. A useful or not so useful innovation inspired by the beautiful animals with the long gracious necks, dark long tongues and four stomachs to help them digest their food.

Illustrate your idea with instructions and diagrams. Build a model of your innovation.

How would you treat a giraffe with a sore throat? When your neck so long avoiding sore throats must be a priority. Speaking of long necks, do you think giraffes have long tongues as well?

Giraffes do have long tongues, not as long as their neck, but its tongue can be almost 50 cm. A giraffe’s neck can be as long as 180 cm. The giraffe is known for its beautiful long dark black, blue or purple tongue.

But why does a giraffe need such a long tongue? And why is the tongue such a dark colour?

Giraffe loves to eat the leaves of acacia trees but the leaves are protected by sharp thorn. The long tongue is perfect for reaching the highest leaves while avoiding the sharp thorns. The tongue has a thick, tough layer that protects it from the thorns. Giraffes spend up to 12 hours each day eating and perhaps the dark colour offers som protection from the hot and harmful rays from the sun. The dark colour may prevent the tongue from getting sunburnt.

An innovation inspired by the giraffe’s four stomaches is the Giraffe Jaws, a type of grinder. Most of the corn plant is wasted since only the kernel is being used for food production. Often the rest of the plant is thrown away. Giraffe Jaws grinds corn into cornmeal and compost is created from the wasted parts of the plant. If you look at the way a giraffe eats you can see that it uses circular movement. Giraffe Jaws grinds the plan in a circular movement. The machine recycles the entire plant.