Why do zebras have stripes?

Answer 1

As far as the reason for the stripes, well there are several.

1: Is the most "duh" of the bunch, that being it is a way to blend into the group and habitat thus making it harder for preds to pick out individuals in the group. It might seem odd considering they are high contrast black and white vs where they live, but when you throw a group together they blend into one massive blurr.

2: The stripes serve also as a finger print thus making it simpler for foals to tell who is mama. The young tend to trail just behind their mother and the stripes over the rump let them know they are following the right bum.

3: The "science" world has exactly yet to figure the why, but for some reason there are species of flies and other flying pests that stay away from herds. Again they have yet to figure out the exact reason, but they believe it has something to do with the stripes.

4: They still argue about it but they also believe that the stripes help to control the body temp of the animal. The old, dark colors absorb the heat, light reflect. Thus the flip flop pattern of the color help to level it all out.

Answer 2

Well actually, this may not be the exact answer you're looking for but; when zebras are in herds together a predator such as a lioness cannot tell one from the other because the stripes are so confusing. The way that the lioness gets one however is getting close enough that they run away and the lioness will pick of the slowest or weakest one. So, their stripes are used for protection. I hope that helped!

Answer 3

Oddly enough, while making zebras indistinguishable to other animals, zebra stripes actually help zebras recognize one another. Stripe patterns are like zebra fingerprints: Every zebra has a slightly different arrangement. Zoologists believe this is how zebras distinguish who's who in a zebra herd. This certainly has significant benefits. A zebra mare and her foal can keep track of each other in the large herd, for example, and a zebra can very quickly distinguish its own herd from another. This also helps human researchers, because it enables them to track particular zebras in the wild.

Answer 4

well, there are many theories for this; some consider that they act as camouflage mechanism, others think that they have a role in sexual attraction, to ward off insects or to keep a low temperature in the african heat... it's not clear yet which is the exact role of the stripes...