With constant updates, her own website and merchandise and thousands watching as a new baby giraffe comes into the world.
The internet throws up many unusual things. In a bizarre turn of events, one of the latest trending topics on Twitter is #AprilTheGiraffe.
April is a giraffe who has become something of an internet celebrity in the past couple of months. Her prolonged pregnancy has been observed by millions. The giraffe is a member of the Animal Adventure Park in Harpursville, some 200 miles away from New York. The internet sensation has had a live feed of her enclosure since February.
On Saturday, April gave birth to the long-overdue calf, to the delight of hundreds of thousands of people who have been monitoring a live cam feed from her pen in a New York zoo in anticipation of the grand event. April was due to give birth in January or February and was pregnant for at least 16 months, compared with the typical gestation period of 15 months, according to zoo officials.
Soon after the parent-to-be went into labour, the park owner took to Facebook to announce it with a video. "We are in labour, 100%!" he said.
The news and online coverage given to April is immense. People have even gone on to call it the most anticipated birth of the year. The park set up a live stream video on its YouTube channel, created and April the Giraffe website, Giraffe emojis, April apparel as well as providing constant updates, with even a text alert system.
Twitter and Facebook were filled with good wishes for April as well as messages of the "This is it!" and "Finally!" variety. The YouTube feed has hundreds of thousands of views and subscribers. Following the announcement that the giraffe was finally giving birth, the YouTube live feed had almost a million current viewers.
The park has however invited criticism from some quarters. The YouTube video live feed was slammed as being sexually explicit and broadcasting nudity and sexual content, and temporarily taken off air. Some have even criticised the camera lights as being too bright for the giraffe's comfort. Others have commented in the invasive nature of the whole spectacle.
Despite the criticism, the publicity has helped raise several thousand dollars for the new giraffe family in just a few days.
The YouTube page on Saturday showed April going into labor and the hooves of the baby first emerging from the standing mother. Afterwards, the spindly 6-foot-tall (1.83-meter) calf, estimated to weigh as much as 150 pounds (68 kg), was seen standing at its mother's side.
Watch the live feed below:
Zoo officials have yet to announce the calf's gender. They plan to hold a contest to name the baby.
Classed as vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List of Threatened Species in 2016, giraffes are the world's tallest mammals. The species is usually found in dry savanna zones south of Africa's Sahara desert.
(With Reuters inputs)
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