How did the zebra get its stripes?
Another interesting question to first consider is: is a zebra a light animal with dark stripes, or a dark animal with light stripes? It’s generally believed that a zebra is a dark animal with light stripes. Most scientists believe that the zebra evolved from a horse-like animal with no stripes.
One theory of where the stripes came from is simply natural selection. Over millions of years, a few zebra foals were born with lighter colored stripes in a process called “accidental variation.” These foals had a marked advantage over their darker colored siblings and thus went on to reproduce in greater numbers, creating more striped offspring.
But how exactly did having stripes create an advantage? Think of an ordinary dark colored horse standing on a hillside. Its silhouette would make it stand out from the background, and would tell a hungry lion exactly where his next meal might come from. Now imagine a striped animal. It’s silhouette would be a bit more mottled and generally different. This likely gave it a camouflaged advantage and probably spared a few animals from hungry lions.
A couple of good sources of information on zebra biology are: Developmental Biology, and the Wikipedia article on zebras.
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