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Kenya’s ‘whistling acacias’ are so-called because they make a whistling sound as the wind blows over hollow galls at the bases of their thorns. These galls are formed by the trees as a response mechanism to attack by large herbivores.

Ants set up home in the galls and they will viciously defend their territory, even against giraffes, which they attack with a poisonous spray keeping the animals away and protecting the trees.

But the ants are good news for patas monkeys which love to break open the galls and eat the ants. And that’s good news for the dwarf gecko, which likes to make its home in the broken galls.