Most populous species, the reticulated dropped from 30,000 to around 5,000.
Movement is minimal,usually about 20-30 km
living in loose, open herds. At a given moment a giraffe may be in a herd composed of all males, all females, females and young, or of both sexes and all ages or all alone if it is a mature bull or a cow guarding a new calf. The fluid nature of giraffe society reflects the need to spend most of its time feeding and to move independently between variably spaced trees, and size that makes it unnecessary to bunch together for mutual security. Also height and excellent eyesight enable giraffes to maintain visual contact at long distances a dozen may be dispersed over 1/2 mi (0.8 km) of savanna and still be in a herd. In fact giraffes rarely cluster together unless they happen to be attracted to the same tree, nervous over the presence of lions, or aggregated in the open. Even at rest, herd members stay over 20 yd apart. As usual, females are more sociable than males and rarely out of sight of other females. Mothers of small calves associate most consistently, at least partly because of a mutual attraction between youngsters that results in creches of up to 9 calves. Average spacing between calves is usually less than 10yd. Males remain in maternal herds until they outgrow their resemblance to females at about 3 years, after which they join bachelor herds. They eventually leave their natal range, whereas females stay put. Home ranges of adults and subadults of the two sexes average 63 miles square in Tsavo NP (163 km square), hut vary enormously from 2 up to 252 miles square (5-654 km square). Once settled, hulls have smaller ranges than cows