Zebra : Wildlife Southern Africa
Zebra : Wildlife Southern Africa
HABITAT: Zebra are very adaptable animals as far as their habitat is concerned. Apart from dense forest, they can be found almost anywhere, but they prefer short grass plains.
HABITS: Zebra are highly gregarious animals, congregating in groups of more than 1000 individuals.The basic social unit is the family group, consisting of one stallion and the mares with their young. This unit stays together, even when they congregate in bigger groups. At this stage, the stallion will spend the greater part of his time, chasing away other stallions from other family groups. They extremely courageous animals, and, very often, they confront predators, like Lion, the latter sometimes coming out second best, after receiving a devastating kick from the Zebra’s hooves.
Zebra associate with other animals, like Baboons, Impala, Kudu, Giraffe, but, the most common is the association between Zebra and w Wildebeest. Zebra can weigh up to 300 Kg, and their life-span is about 20 years.
DIET: Zebra are exclusively grazers.
BREEDING: After a gestation period of about one year, one single foal is born. Females reach maturity at 3 years of age.
BREEDS
Grevy’s Zebras
The Grevy’s zebra is the largest of the wild equids and is usually considered the most primitive morphologically. Adults attain shoulder heights of 140 to 150 centimeters (55-57 in.) and may weigh 400 kilograms (880 lbs.) or more. Its very narrow and closely spaced stripes make the Grevy the most strikingly beautiful of the zebras. The stripes extend all the way to the broad hooves, leaving only the belly white. A broad black dorsal stripe is set off by a narrow zone of white on either side. Grevys are long legged and rather slenderly built with a long head. The black-tipped mane is relatively long and erect; their ears are very large and rounded. Grevy’s zebras bray in a manner similar to a donkey.
Plains Zebra
African equids for the most part replace one another geographically. There is a zone of overlap, however, between the Grevy’s zebra and the plains zebra on the floodplain of the Ewaso Nyiro in northern Kenya. Here the two species form mixed grazing herds, but there is no record of interbreeding.
The plains zebra is the most abundant and widespread of extant wild equids, occurring throughout the tropical grasslands of East and southern Africa. It is quite stout in comparison with the Grevy’s zebra. Shoulder height varies from 120 to 140 centimeters (47-55 in.), and a mature male may weigh 300 kilograms (660 lbs.). Broad vertical stripes on the sides bend on the flanks to become horizontal across the rump. Stripes extend down the rather short legs to broad hooves. The stripes on the sides continue into the short, erect mane and meet under the belly. Stripes become less distinct on subspecies in the more southerly parts of its range. The plains zebra has a “bark” quite unlike the neigh of a horse or the bray of a donkey. Plains zebra have a harem-type social organization.
Mountain Zebras
The third zebra species is the mountain zebra. The most diagnostic feature of both mountain zebra subspecies is a square flap of skin or dewlap on the throat, best developed on males. Mountain zebras never form the large herds characteristic of plains zebras, but do exhibit a harem-type social system. During the winter they move up to twenty kilometers (12 mi.) from a water source. Where they are hunted, they water at night; where they are unmolested, they water at any time.
Two subspecies are recognized. Hartmann’s zebra (Equus zebra hartmanni) occupies the rugged, broken terrain at the edge of the African Plateau east of the Namib Desert. Its habitat grades from an open woodland with a divers, grassy understory in southern Angola and Namibia to the succulent steppe of the Karroo in South Africa. In the 1950s, mountain zebras numbered between 50,000 and 75,000 and were regarded as vermin by an expanding livestock industry. Especially in drought years zebras competed with cattle for forage and water, and stampeding zebras occasionally tore down fences. By 1960 only 10,000 were left; and in 1973 Hartmann’s zebra was considered and endangered species, with approximately 7,000 head remaining.
