For centuries, scientists have made many guesses as to why zebras have stripes. In Charles Darwin’s The Descent of Man, he concluded that zebras use their stripes to attract potential mating partners. On the other hand, Alfred Russel Wallace believed that the stripes of a zebra help them camouflage into the background in twilight. Some other hypotheses include using the stripes to confuse predators through optical illusions and motion dazzle (when zebras run together and their stripes make confusing configurations).
To find the answer to their long-sought-after-question, we turn to look at what Tim Caro has found and published here. Caro’s team at The University of California, Davis, studied zebras, horses and asses (with seven species, and some subspecies). They found out that zebras have stripes in order to ward off flies.
“We found again and again and again [that] the only factor which is highly associated with striping is to ban biting flies,” said study leader Tim Caro. Zebras, it seems, are more susceptible to the bites of flies because their hair is shorter. Then due to evolution, they have developed the way of striping to repel biting flies.
This is thought provoking because not only does it answer a question humans have asked for centuries, but it also opens up the door to new studies. Is vision something to think about when bug repellent is designed? Why do certain shapes and configurations repel flies?