The Okapi Is Not a Giraffe Intermediate

More problems with giraffe
evolution: the Okapi inter-
mediate has been discredited

 

by Jerry Bergman, PhD

One of the most famous evolutionary icons was the evolution of the giraffe’s neck from short to long. It was first made popular as the main proof for Lamarckian evolution, also called the “use or disuse” theory of evolution. Lamarckism, defined as the inheritance of acquired characteristics, is the belief that an organism can pass on to its offspring physical characteristics that the parent organism acquired through use or disuse during its lifetime.

Lamarckian evolution is illustrated by pictures showing a giraffe stretching its neck to reach the higher, more leafy parts of the tree. This stretched neck is then (according to the theory) passed on to its offspring. As shown in the illustration, by this process, each generation would have a slightly longer neck until it reached the average length of modern giraffes.

 

This, and similar pictures, were very effective in teaching evolution, but, Professor Ghiselin argues, they were misleading if not plainly wrong. In his words,

“Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck (1744-1829) takes a prominent place in many biology textbooks and life-science textbooks, which depict him as the author of a “theory” of evolution based upon the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Lamarck’s views, these books say, should be rejected in favor of the theory of evolution by natural selection, propounded by Charles Darwin (1809-1882), because only Darwin’s theory is compatible with the findings of 20th-century genetics. … The Lamarck presented in schoolbooks, however, is a fiction — an imaginary figure who has been fashioned from hearsay and wrong guesses, and who has been replicated in countless books by successive teams of plagiarists.”[1]

When a belief that supports evolution is proven wrong by science, retaining the evolutionary worldview demands creating another explanation. Although the traditional Lamarckian view is no longer taught, because his intuitive idea, along with illustrations, have been very effective in supporting evolution, they are still used by evolutionists. As a result, the “use and disuse” theory of neck evolution has been replaced by the mutation/selection view. However, there is now clear evidence from scientific research against the idea that mutation/natural selection slowly elongated the giraffe neck.  This has motivated evolutionists to claim a new theory: namely, that courtship competition was the driving force behind the evolution of long necks.

The courtship competition theory

When males confront each other in the competition for females, they swing their two-to-three-meter-long necks in battle which functions as a battering ram.  The evolutionists then postulate that giraffes with longer necks are more likely to win the battle. Consequently, they are more likely to mate with a female. This process, evolutionists argue, is why and how the neck evolved.[2]

Arguments against this theory are numerous. The giraffe fossil record shows no evidence of neck evolution: the first giraffe had a long neck, similar to that of modern giraffes. Furthermore, many animals fight for females, as do giraffes; none of them have long necks comparable to those of giraffes. Also, the “fight for mates” theory would predict that the neck would continue to grow longer than currently exists on modern giraffes. No evidence of such changes has been found.

The Samotherium major “Missing Link”

The “missing link” issue still persists for evolutionists. One of the claimed missing links that was recently found was Samotherium major. This fossil was placed within the presumed evolution of the giraffe from a very short neck to the long neck of giraffes today. S major is considered by many evolutionists to be a crucial transitional intermediate fossil between short-necked ancestors and modern giraffes because it allegedly displays key neck-lengthening features.[3] Professor Danowitz et al. said in 2015,

“The examination and evaluation of giraffid fossil specimens not only provide evidence for the evolution of cervical elongation, but also demonstrate the loci where lengthening occurred…. cranial lengthening is the first stage of elongation seen in the family, followed by caudal lengthening, which accounts for the extreme Giraffa neck elongation.”[4]

Recent evaluation of Samotherium major bones, however, has found that it too has problems that challenge the assumption that it represents a “perfect intermediate” link between the okapi (Okapia johnstoni) and the modern giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis).

An almost complete neck of this alleged intermediate allowed for a comprehensive analysis of its anatomical features, permitting more precise comparisons between the short-necked okapi and long-necked giraffe. The conclusion of a 2022 analysis by the Chinese Academy of Sciences is that Samotherium major does share several common characteristics with the modern giraffe, and for numerous reasons it is not an ancestor of the giraffe or the okapi.²  The fact is, the giraffe’s long neck has long been an evolutionary mystery, and as we will discuss, it still is, notwithstanding S. major.[5]

Evolution’s Tall Tale — The Giraffe Neck

One of the problems with S. major being a link between Okapi and modern giraffes is that its skull and neck morphologies differ greatly from those of the giraffe. Even their diet was very different. S. major, given its rounded muzzle and dental features, is designed to consume grass, as do cows. It lived in open woodland and was a grazer consuming grasses and low-growing plants, similar to modern cattle. Given this fact, it would not be reaching for leaves in trees, which was the original theory used to explain its evolution. Nor does any evidence exist for its neck serving as a fight mechanism to seek mates. In contrast, living giraffes are specialized high-level browsers that feed on tree leaves. S. major’s neck was only one meter long, half as long as the giraffe’s, at two meters in length.

S. major possessed a single pair of slender ossicones, which are skin-covered structures different than those found on the giraffe’s head. Ossicones are very different structures than horns or antlers. Horns and antlers are formed from hardened cartilage fused to the skull. Ossicones are constructed of cartilage which becomes ossified as the animal matures. They are present in both male and female giraffes; typically, thinner, tufted ossicones exist in females and thicker, often hairless structures are found in males. Giraffe calves are born with ossicones lying flat to aid birth. They become upright as the animal grows and they become ossified.

They then typically curve backward and point upward. Modern giraffes possess a prominent third (median) ossicone located in the middle of the forehead, which is absent in S. major. Samotherium was a large animal, about the size of a moose (3-4 meters tall),  but at 300 to 650 kg had a fraction of the modern giraffe’s weight (1,900 kg or 4,200 pounds), leg length, and overall height. Numerous other differences also exist. The conclusion of the most detailed study of S. major was that “the question of how the giraffe’s extremely long neck originated remains entirely unresolved within an evolutionary framework.”[6]

References

[1] Ghiselin, Michael T., “The imaginary Lamarck: A look at bogus “history” in schoolbooks,” The Textbook Letter,  https://web.archive.org/web/20001012042617/http://www.textbookleague.org/54marck.htm, September–October 1994.

[2] Sherwin, Frank. 2022. Giraffe Neck Evolution? IVR News. June 13, 2022. https://www.icr.org/content/giraffe-neck-evolution.

[3] Danowitz, M., et al, “Fossil evidence and stages of elongation of the Giraffa camelopardalis neck,” Royal Society Open Science, 2015.

[4] Danowitz, et al, 2015.

[5] Chinese Academy of Sciences, “Strange fossil solves giraffe evolutionary mystery,” https://phys.org/news/2022-06-strange-fossil-giraffe-evolutionary-mystery.html, 2 June 2022.

[6] Lonning, Wolf-Ekkehard, “A link between the okapi and the giraffe? It seems not,” Science & Culture Today, 2025.

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Dr. Jerry Bergman has taught biology, genetics, chemistry, biochemistry, anthropology, geology, and microbiology for over 40 years at several colleges and universities including Bowling Green State University, Medical College of Ohio where he was a research associate in experimental pathology, and The University of Toledo. He is a graduate of the Medical College of Ohio, Wayne State University in Detroit, the University of Toledo, and Bowling Green State University. He has over 1,900 publications in 14 languages and 40 books and monographs. His books and textbooks that include chapters that he authored are in over 1,800 college libraries in 27 countries. So far over 80,000 copies of the 60 books and monographs that he has authored or co-authored are in print. For more articles by Dr Bergman, see his Author Profile.