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A lonely giraffe has begun a 40-hour road trip to a new home – in search of warmer weather and maybe a mate.

Jealousy had forced Benito to leave a zoo in the Mexican state of Sinaloa last year, and he was relocated to a park near the US border with temperatures as low as 9C (48F).

Campaigners have been calling for the four-year-old to move to sunnier climes – and now, a specially designed container will transport him to a safari park about 90 miles (145km) away.

Benito is travelling in a crate that has been strapped to the back of a truck – and while he is 16m (52ft) high, the roof can be lowered to pass under bridges.

His head sticks through the top of the box, but tarp is being used to insulate him from the cold, wind and rain.

Well-wishers shouted “we love you Benito” as he began his journey.

One local resident in Ciudad Juarez, where the giraffe had stayed until recently, said: “We’re a little said that he’s leaving, but it also gives us great pleasure… the weather conditions are not suitable for him.”

In the summer, Benito had little shade in his half-acre enclosure – with photos showing him crouching to fit underneath a small canopy.

Ice would sometimes form on the enclosure’s pond in the winter, and there were few trees to munch on.

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He was born at a zoo that was home to two other giraffes who were a couple – but couldn’t stay there because zookeepers feared the male would become territorial and attack young Benito.

There are three female giraffes at his new home, and Benito will be living in a much larger space that more closely resembles his natural habitat.

Frank Carlos Camacho, who is accompanying the giraffe on his long journey, said that “Benito is doing very, very well” – and has been given plenty of treats as a reward.

Straw, alfalfa, water and vegetables are inside his container – as well as equipment so technicians can talk to Benito en route.

A convoy of police, environmental officials and the National Guard are escorting him.

“He is ready to be a giraffe,” Mr Camacho said. “He will reproduce soon, and contribute to the conservation of this wonderful species.”

One of the world’s most popular YouTubers has revealed that he made over £200,000 in ad revenue by posting a video on X.

MrBeast is renowned for creating expensive videos, including competitions where contestants battle it out to win huge cash prizes.

While he has more than 233 million subscribers on YouTube, the influencer said he was curious to see how profitable it would be to post on Elon Musk’s platform.

The 25-year-old uploaded an old video called “$1 Car vs $100,000,000 Car” – comparing luxury motors at different price points.

Over three days, it generated 124 million views – generating $263,355 (£207,214) in revenue.

“But it’s a bit of a facade,” MrBeast told his 26.6 million followers on X. “Advertisers saw the attention it was getting and bought ads on my video (I think) and thus my revenue per view is prob higher than what you’d experience.”

The star is now vowing to give away the ad revenue, meaning 10 random followers will receive £20,000 each.

Musk has been attempting to entice X users to sign up for a premium subscription service by promising them a share of ad revenues.

But at the end of December, MrBeast had suggested he was reluctant to share his videos on the social network.

At the time, he had written: “My videos cost millions to make and even if they got a billion views on X it wouldn’t fund a fraction of it.”

While YouTube videos can continue to generate healthy views for weeks on end, content on X tends to lose momentum as its algorithms prioritise newer content.

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Some X users have claimed that MrBeast’s video has popped up in their feed multiple times as an unlabelled advert – despite the fact they don’t follow the influencer.

A view of his post by NBC News, Sky News’ US partner, found X users had the option to select “Not interested in this ad” when it appeared – an option not typically available on posts that aren’t ads.

MrBeast – whose real name is Jimmy Donaldson – and X didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.

Since Musk introduced the ability for the public to see how many times posts are viewed, some users have questioned how useful the metrics are and whether they’re misleading.

Unlike YouTube view metrics, which show how many times users have actually watched a part of a video, X metrics show how many times a post was viewed in total, even if a user didn’t engage with or click on it at all.