ALL THE LARGE AFRICAN MAMMALS that wildlife
veterinarian Pete Morkel has had to capture
over his career—lions, forest elephants, white
rhinos—giraffes are the most stressful. “With
other animals, you’re trying to give just enough
anesthetic to immobilize them, but with a
giraffe, we use a total overdose to chemically
knock them off their feet,” the sun-leathered
59-year-old tells me as I stalk him stalking a
two-year-old female giraffe somewhere in the
Nigerien bush, about 60 miles east of Niamey,
Niger’s capital. He is wearing a camo hat and a
pair of torn, purple-checkered boxers that he’s
been wearing as shorts for the past several days.OF
94 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC