Hey Zebras, Why the Stripes? January 23, 2016
Posted by geoff in News.trackback
Speaking of nature, the latest thinking on zebra stripes is that they have nothing to do with camouflage against predators:
In open treeless habitats where zebras spend most time, zebras are as clearly identified by the lion visual system as are similar-sized ungulates, suggesting that stripes cannot confer crypsis by disrupting the zebra’s outline….In conclusion, compared to the uniform pelage of other sympatric herbivores it appears highly unlikely that stripes are a form of anti-predator camouflage.
They also doubt that it has anything to do with mating or social status in the herd. So why the stripes? Maybe it’s a defense against biting flies, which apparently prefer not to land on surfaces with stripes less than 5 cm wide (the largest average zebra strip width (found on the rump) is just under 4 cm).
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Innocent Bystanders 
So you’re saying…
The science *isn’t* settled???
HHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM
…That was supposed to have ‘puts on sunglasses’ in there, but I guess WordPress decided it was bad HTML (which I guess it was, since I used the greater-than/less-than brackets I always think of as “alligators”) and removed it.
WINNING
Really interesting article, Geoff. Does this mean a zebra-striped wrap of some kind will keep deer flies from biting me while hiking?
Could be – they only checked 3 species of African biting flies.
But beware of those East Coast hunters with zebra permits.
The closest East coasters come near Zebras is when they are crossing the road on a pedestrian crossing.
WHY CAN’T THE ZEBRA CHANGE ITS STRIPES?
Hey Zebra, why the long face?
(it had to be said)
When a herd of zeebers runs en-masse, a predator sees a bigass striped caterpillar jamming in overdrive, stops the pursuit and sits down to lick itself.
The stripes make them look slimmer. The lions say “Let’s wait for a fat one” and sit down to wait. By the time they realized what’s really going on they end up getting the stragglers at the end of the herd.
Kind of like last call in a singles bar.