Page 38 - Fourways Gardens March 2021

Nature

the YeAR of the ZeBRA

B y Ja M es c larke, Pho t ogr a P hy B y Mary Bro adley

ne of the most notable things Their association is also said to have a number. Twice, on separate days, we had
we found in rain-soaked survival purpose because one of them, the entire hide to ourselves.
Kruger Park last month was and I am not sure which, is said to be
Othe high number of zebras. more alert than the other and likely to But it was the sight of so many zebras that
Oh yes, and of course how green it was. spot a predator in time. Certainly you will enthralled us.
I cannot recall seeing so much vigorous never catch zebra, all heads down at the
growth and so much water even after the same time, grazing. There’ll always be Whenever we saw zebra, mostly in small
Millennium Flood. some on the lookout. herds and at the roadside, we were able to
get quite close. They were unfazed and we
The grass was as high as an elephant’s eye Our observations were, of course, highly were able to study them and wonder anew
and 2021 is surely going to be noted in subjective for we only had access to what their bizarre stripes were all about.
the park as the year of the zebras. I have the southwestern corner between the
never seen so many. Phabeni Gate and Skukuza. All the sand Nobody really knows. Each animal has
roads were closed. a different pattern – a bit like human
One tends to take the Burchell’s zebra, the fingerprints. Science has established
plains zebra, for granted. It is a species We’d visited the park three months earlier that zebras are, basically, white animals
instantly recognised and associated with to report on the effects of the collapse in with black stripes and not the other way
Africa all over the world. tourism and the closure of camps. Panic around. And they can raise the hairs along
Dam near Skukuza - the park’s premier the black stripes but not the white hairs in
The zebra’s favourite grazing companions, hide - was padlocked. We feared it would between.
the blue wildebeest, appeared to be still be closed this time but, to our joy, the
totally outnumbered this season, maybe gate was unlocked. A notice announced But why would evolution have left them so
by as much as 10 to one. The two tend to that only 10 people were allowed at a vividly striped when all other four-legged
graze together because zebra prefer taller time, though nobody was around to animals have developed cryptically-
grasses and this opens up the shorter count. Under normal circumstances the coloured hides? One suggestion is that
stuff favoured by wildebeest. hide can take three or four times that the stripes break up the animal’s image

Fourways Gardens • 36 • March 2021