Young giraffe dies at Maryland Zoo in Baltimore.jpegw1440

Young giraffe dies at Maryland Zoo in Baltimore

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Normally, Willow was one of the best eaters.

The 6-year-old giraffe at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore would eagerly reach down her long neck to be fed a giraffe delicacy — acacia leaves.

Mike Evitts, a spokesman for the zoo, said Willow is “food motivated.” But zookeepers on Friday noticed something was wrong with their leggy friend’s appetite and worried she had a stomach problem. She was treated and appeared stable while experts watched closely. She worsened Monday, and experts euthanized her, Evitts said.

“She had some signs of moving food through her system on Sunday, but by Monday her symptoms were getting worse and we thought it humane to euthanize her,” Evitts said. He called Willow’s death a “tremendous loss” in a statement, and her cause of death is still unknown.

An autopsy was performed this week, but it showed “nothing conclusive as to the cause of death,” Evitts said. Zoo officials are still awaiting the results of the pathology samples sent to Johns Hopkins and they hope this will provide more details on what caused her death. They await Hopkins’ results in the coming weeks, Evitts said.

Willow was born in 2017 and had become a local celebrity. Her birth was unique because she was the first giraffe to be born at the facility in 20 years, and more than 26,000 people voted on her name.

The baby giraffe at the Maryland Zoo is named Willow

Willow went from being a “clumsy calf with ossicones that looked like pigtails to a beautiful icon of the zoo and its endangered species,” zoo keepers said in a statement. They said their presence at the feeding station is missed.

Her father Caesar is still at the zoo, but her mother Juma died of lymphoma in November 2017. In the same year, another giraffe named Julius died after a long illness. He was only a month old and an autopsy showed he had lesions on the left side of his brain.

The Maryland Zoo has another giraffe – a female named Kesi. Established in 1876, the facility is the third oldest zoo in the United States. It has approximately 1,500 animals and is located in the Druid Hill Park neighborhood near downtown Baltimore.

Giraffes are native to Africa, and their populations have declined 40 percent over the past three decades, experts said. They are considered “Vulnerable” according to a list by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.