Rare spotless baby giraffe born at US zoo

A giraffe without spots at a Tennessee zoo may be plain, but it’s definitely not ordinary.

The female reticulated giraffe was born July 31 at the family-owned Brights Zoo in Limestone, a rural community in northeastern Tennessee.

David Bright, one of the zoo’s owners, said the plain brown animal is a rarity: research found another giraffe that was born without a pattern in Tokyo in 1972 and two others before that. The spots serve as camouflage for giraffes in the wild.

The yet-unnamed baby is healthy and on display at the 103-acre (42-acre) zoo along with its mother, he said.

The zoo took the unusual step of posting about the giraffe on its Facebook page in an effort to help conservation efforts, Bright said.