Auto Safari Zoo 1989 - Giraffe feeding

Feeding stand for giraffes and other animals.

Five reticulata/giraffa type giraffe ...

Five giraffes?

And since we're on the subject of this photo (taken from a bus from far away) would you be able to idendify the antelope type that is on the photo with the giraffes? Looks like some kind of 'bok' ...

If you enlarge the photo, you can unstrip that assemblage and count 4 heads + a smaller 1 to the right above the antelope.

The antelope species in question are nilgai (Boselaphus tragocamelus).
These are a regular with blackbuck (Antilope cervicapra) in western Mediterranean open range safari parks and regular trad zoos.

Thanks K.B., I never would have thought it was Nilgai, but I trust you

I'm with K.B. - definitely Nilgai - the one in the middle has the grey-blue adult male coloration, the others are brown females/subadult males.

I have the actual photo full-size (digitised from old negatives by Kodak, these are after all over 20 year old photos ) on my hard drive so I could zoom in better than you could have, if you would save it from the Zoochat website onto your computers. So here is what I see and think:

The antelope behind the first antelope is indeed a Nilgai; the grey blue colour and the large size is there. However, the light-brown colour antelope in front of the Nilgai is the puzzle. I looked up photos of female Nilgai and both colouration and 'body shape' (can't exactly put in words what I mean) just don't match up. Second thing is the horns, which I know is impossible for you to zoom into to see clearly though. They kind of bend backwards, look like those of Bontebok/Blesbok, although of course this antelope is neither. Female Nilgai don't seem to have any horns of note.

I looked at the full size image and I can see what you're seeing as horns but I think it's just shadow - the front animal has the black and white 'ankle socks' of a Nilgai, and I'm not aware of any species with similar markings.

I looked at the photo even closer after your last comment and you're most likely right; I could have sworn it was horns though Mystery solved!

Honestly, please take it from an antelope specialist man ... the ones you are talking about in light brown are the female nilgai. They really are a common sight in places like Spain and Italy (esp. in the open range semi-arid environments as on Mallorca).