Did you know the collective noun for a group of zebra is a dazzle? Which is apt here in Africa, where its trademark black and white stripes seem to stand out incongruously against the khaki and sand background. However, there is good reason for this. A zebra’s stripy coat is thought to disperse more than 70 per cent of incoming heat, preventing the animal from overheating in the African sun. This is because air moves at different speeds over light-absorbing black stripes and light-reflecting white stripes, so the zebra creates its own cooling air currents. Another feature of their striped pattern is that it acts as a bug repellent, keeping horseflies and other blood-suckers at bay.
Zebra are very speedy animals and can reach speeds of up to 65km/h when galloping, which is just fast enough to outpace predators such as lion. And, rather incredibly, zebra foals are born with legs that are the same hight as an adult’s, which mean they can easily hide from predators in the herd and run with the dazzle within a few hours of birth.
Widespread across vast areas of southern Africa, zebra live in the treeless grasslands and savannah woodlands. However, their habitat is shrinking and the ICNU currently lists the plains zebra species as Near Threatened.
Here in the Simalaha Community Conservancy, the zebra graze peacefully, inquisitive of humans but not afraid. Many of them have been brought into the conservancy over the past decade by Peace Parks Foundation, to serve as breeding herds to repopulate the area and rebalance the ecosystems after many years of unsustainable use of wildlife had almost cleared the area of original species.
Despite a close resemblance to horses, zebra is a much more aggressive and dangerous species, making them notoriously difficult to translocate. During the relocation to Simalaha, the zebras were kept in their family groups which made them more relaxed and much less aggressive with each other.
