The surprising reason zebras have stripes - Cella Wright
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Date: 2024-09-04
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Comments and reviews: 20
heck-r
Somewhere I heard that some study speculated that it's also a group camouflage, where the point is not for zebras not to be noticed (which would hard with their big herd, but rather for individual zebras not to stand out from the heard.
The reason they thought of this is that it was hard to track individual zebra, so they marked one or two with some bright colored ring or something, but to their dismay, the lions seemed to hunt the visually distinguishable zebras very quickly, maybe because there was a more obvious target they could gang up on, increasing the chance of capture.
I don't think this ever became more than a hypothesis, and I don't know why such extreme striping would be better than just being consistently grey, but it could be that the high contrast stripes and the extreme color somehow works against how predators normally distinguish prey.
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Somewhere I heard that some study speculated that it's also a group camouflage, where the point is not for zebras not to be noticed (which would hard with their big herd, but rather for individual zebras not to stand out from the heard.
The reason they thought of this is that it was hard to track individual zebra, so they marked one or two with some bright colored ring or something, but to their dismay, the lions seemed to hunt the visually distinguishable zebras very quickly, maybe because there was a more obvious target they could gang up on, increasing the chance of capture.
I don't think this ever became more than a hypothesis, and I don't know why such extreme striping would be better than just being consistently grey, but it could be that the high contrast stripes and the extreme color somehow works against how predators normally distinguish prey.
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teamraider8663
I worked in a lab in Taiwan that also had this as the main theory. The idea is that because most insects have compound eyes, the spacing of the patterns serves as a way to mess with the sense of positioning of the zebra relative to the fly, resulting in a lack of decreasing speed in preparation for landing or entirely missing as a whole. The research I did used honey bees (easier to raise and control since we just need sugar water to attract them) but it should be the same for flies in theory. What's also interesting is that there was a certain stripe width needed before it was effective, like just having the stripes isn't enough the pattern needed to have a width less than a certain threshold in order to mess with the honey bee flight behaviors.
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I worked in a lab in Taiwan that also had this as the main theory. The idea is that because most insects have compound eyes, the spacing of the patterns serves as a way to mess with the sense of positioning of the zebra relative to the fly, resulting in a lack of decreasing speed in preparation for landing or entirely missing as a whole. The research I did used honey bees (easier to raise and control since we just need sugar water to attract them) but it should be the same for flies in theory. What's also interesting is that there was a certain stripe width needed before it was effective, like just having the stripes isn't enough the pattern needed to have a width less than a certain threshold in order to mess with the honey bee flight behaviors.
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tec-jones5445
Perhaps another piece of evidence comes from the now tragically extinct zebra subspecies: the Quagga.
This population lived outside of the range of biting flies in South Africa, where it's too cool/dry for the insects. The quagga is well known for having far fewer stripes than other zebras, being more uniformly brown past the neck, as seen in other temperate equids.
If a subspecies population of zebras can seemingly lose their stripes in the absence of flies, this might provide further evidence for the insect repellent hypothesis. Though the animal's extinction makes this harder to verify with much certainty.
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Perhaps another piece of evidence comes from the now tragically extinct zebra subspecies: the Quagga.
This population lived outside of the range of biting flies in South Africa, where it's too cool/dry for the insects. The quagga is well known for having far fewer stripes than other zebras, being more uniformly brown past the neck, as seen in other temperate equids.
If a subspecies population of zebras can seemingly lose their stripes in the absence of flies, this might provide further evidence for the insect repellent hypothesis. Though the animal's extinction makes this harder to verify with much certainty.
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adamm4562
I was told by a safari guide in Kenya that Zebras striping is for defensive herd camouflage. Lions and other land predators have to be discerning with their exertion of energy and try to get easy prey. So the striping helps defend the young and the weak amongst the herd by blending them into the rest of the herd, making it harder for the predators to keep track of and bear down on a single zebra. Kind of a can’t see the tree for the forest phenomenon. That’s always stuck with me because it’s so odd and fascinating
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I was told by a safari guide in Kenya that Zebras striping is for defensive herd camouflage. Lions and other land predators have to be discerning with their exertion of energy and try to get easy prey. So the striping helps defend the young and the weak amongst the herd by blending them into the rest of the herd, making it harder for the predators to keep track of and bear down on a single zebra. Kind of a can’t see the tree for the forest phenomenon. That’s always stuck with me because it’s so odd and fascinating
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micahbush5397
Between the tropical diseases and pests, the Sahara Desert limiting the transmission of technology, and the difficulty of domesticating Sub-Saharan species, one starts to understand how Sub-Saharan Africa was overtaken by Europe in the global political arena.
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Between the tropical diseases and pests, the Sahara Desert limiting the transmission of technology, and the difficulty of domesticating Sub-Saharan species, one starts to understand how Sub-Saharan Africa was overtaken by Europe in the global political arena.
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bottasheimfe5750
another reason why Domesticating zebras is so difficult is Zebras don't have the same Family structures Horses do. with Wild Horses all you gotta do is tame the Horse that leads its herd in Migrations and the other horses will be much easier to deal with.
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another reason why Domesticating zebras is so difficult is Zebras don't have the same Family structures Horses do. with Wild Horses all you gotta do is tame the Horse that leads its herd in Migrations and the other horses will be much easier to deal with.
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lanzer22
The effectiveness of striped patterns made sense when it comes to confusing insects. It's just strange how how striped patterns showed up in evolution, and if there were no mosquitos, would random zebras still evolve to have striped skins
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The effectiveness of striped patterns made sense when it comes to confusing insects. It's just strange how how striped patterns showed up in evolution, and if there were no mosquitos, would random zebras still evolve to have striped skins
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frogglen6350
When you live in an environment full of lions, painted dogs, hyenas, angry elephants and hippos, nile crocodiles, leopards, and cape Buffalo plus deadly insects, it makes sense that Zebras evolved to be the way they are.
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When you live in an environment full of lions, painted dogs, hyenas, angry elephants and hippos, nile crocodiles, leopards, and cape Buffalo plus deadly insects, it makes sense that Zebras evolved to be the way they are.
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ultroytheroy34
Zebra's are bullies once they are old enough I've always wondered how I got out aged by animal born at the same time as me. I just believe in distorting colour theory when it comes to the stripes
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Zebra's are bullies once they are old enough I've always wondered how I got out aged by animal born at the same time as me. I just believe in distorting colour theory when it comes to the stripes
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51countrymix
Interesting video. I previously had no idea zebras had ever been used anywhere in a military context. On the stripes - immmm, not really convinced any of the perspective's discussed is correct.
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Interesting video. I previously had no idea zebras had ever been used anywhere in a military context. On the stripes - immmm, not really convinced any of the perspective's discussed is correct.
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phoenixflamegames1
So basically, it doesn’t confuse predators but it does confuse biting flies which is helpful when a lot of biting flies can kill them. So indirectly, it’s still meant as confusion.
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So basically, it doesn’t confuse predators but it does confuse biting flies which is helpful when a lot of biting flies can kill them. So indirectly, it’s still meant as confusion.
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thomaslai1381
Now we want to know if such striping can work for humans Would wearing zebra stripe-patterned clothing help reduce bug bites And if so, against which bugs would such striping work
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Now we want to know if such striping can work for humans Would wearing zebra stripe-patterned clothing help reduce bug bites And if so, against which bugs would such striping work
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ted_ed
this videos are always so educative, not only for teaching. i watch this when I eat something at any time. the longer the video, the more I lear and longer I take eating anything. hahaha
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this videos are always so educative, not only for teaching. i watch this when I eat something at any time. the longer the video, the more I lear and longer I take eating anything. hahaha
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Ketowski
Good gathering of information, except that zebras don’t have calves. They have foals like other members of the horse family. Oops!
Good to know about the striping and flies.
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Good gathering of information, except that zebras don’t have calves. They have foals like other members of the horse family. Oops!
Good to know about the striping and flies.
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oldcowbb
makes sense, flies use optical flow to control speed and direction, repeating pattern messes up with the cross correlation across time, makes them lose control over their speed
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makes sense, flies use optical flow to control speed and direction, repeating pattern messes up with the cross correlation across time, makes them lose control over their speed
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Necrobin
I've been to Namibia and seen Zebras stand in dry/leafless undergrowth where they were really hard to spot when they didn't move. At least the camoflage function worked for me!
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I've been to Namibia and seen Zebras stand in dry/leafless undergrowth where they were really hard to spot when they didn't move. At least the camoflage function worked for me!
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gerhardkiels
Please, put a seizure warning in the future if such patterns are present in the video, such as at timestamp 4: 21 of this one. You're being very irresponsible othewise.
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Please, put a seizure warning in the future if such patterns are present in the video, such as at timestamp 4: 21 of this one. You're being very irresponsible othewise.
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jarekwrzosek2048
Horse: Hey, those flies are really getting on my nerves, How comethey don't bother you
Zebra: Oh, it's easy. I give them visual epilepsy with my pattern.
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Horse: Hey, those flies are really getting on my nerves, How comethey don't bother you
Zebra: Oh, it's easy. I give them visual epilepsy with my pattern.
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rollintweeds234
Brilliant research and surprising findings. I've been laboring under the 'harder to cut an individual from the pack' delusion for years. Thank you, TED-Ed!
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Brilliant research and surprising findings. I've been laboring under the 'harder to cut an individual from the pack' delusion for years. Thank you, TED-Ed!
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ted_ed
Can you also make a video on why Zebra's are so difficult to domesticate
I do kinda already know why. But it's never a bad thing to have Ted go into a topic.
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Can you also make a video on why Zebra's are so difficult to domesticate
I do kinda already know why. But it's never a bad thing to have Ted go into a topic.
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