Study in Black-and-White

[This is, finally, my last post from my Botswana trip. I hope you enjoyed the ride. For a while now it will all be my backyard woods in Maine.]

The zebras in this part of Africa are Burchell’s (or Plains) Zebra. Their stripes are separated by ghostly brown shadow stripes, and each animal is slightly different. Look for example at the center of their noses, just below the eyes.

Or the necks of the front two below:

The stripes form a corset all the way under their bellies to the middle, as displayed by this snoozing animal:

These were in a mixed group with wildebeest (and impala):

The wildebeest, potentially intimidating, do not seem to bother the zebras:

On another occasion they were mingled with giraffe:

The mothers and babies are a delight.

Most of the babies were quite big in February, but still very affectionate:

They are somewhat independent now:

but their coat is still fluffy:

Zebra often host oxpeckers, which remove parasites. This one has three:

And some show wounds from encounters with lions. Look at the rump of the one below:

The dark circle on the inside of its foreleg is a callous, often called a Chestnut. It may be the vestige of a gland like those that antelope have, but it seems to have no such function in the zebra. Domestic horses have these too, on all four legs.