Grévy's zebra

Grévy's zebras eat grass.

They also eat bark, fruit and leaves. They spend a lot of the day eating. In dry times they eat even longer.

Grévy's zebras mainly eat grasses, but they also eat bark, fruit and leaves. Dry-country grass is tough and not very nourishing, so they must eat a lot of it, spending about 60 percent of the day feeding. In dry times, when food is scarce, eating can take up to 80 percent of their time.

Zebras help other grazers by clearing off the coarse tops of grasses that other animals find hard to digest. A mother feeding a foal needs to drink at least every other day.

The diet is mainly grasses, supplemented by bark, fruit and leaves. Low nutrient content means high intake: the Smithsonian's National Zoo reports about 60 percent of the day spent feeding, rising to 80 percent in dry periods. Incisors in both jaws clip vegetation, and high-crowned, ridged molars with thick enamel grind abrasive grass.

Animal Diversity Web explains that Grévy's zebra fills a niche between the wild asses, which prefer more arid habitat, and plains zebras, which depend more on water. Lactating females, however, must drink at least every other day, so males whose territories contain safe water get access to more females.

Grévy's zebras do not live in families like other zebras.

Moms and foals stay together. Many grown-up males live alone in their own big patch of land.

Unlike other zebras, Grévy's zebras do not live in families that stay together. The closest bond is between a mother and her foal. Mothers and foals may join up in small, changing groups.

Many adult males live alone, each guarding a large territory with good grass and water. They mark it with piles of dung and loud calls. Males without territories wander in small bachelor groups of two to six.

Grévy's zebras have no permanent herds or lasting bonds between adults; the two most stable relationships are a stallion's attachment to his territory and a mare's to her foal. Mare-and-foal units join into fluid groups, usually of fewer than ten mares, though larger numbers gather at water in the dry season.

Territorial males hold areas of about 2 to 12 square kilometers, on average 6, around grazing and water, marking them with dung piles called middens and loud calls, and may keep them for up to seven years. Non-territorial males form loose bachelor groups of two to six. This contrasts sharply with the stable harems of the plains zebra.

There are not many Grévy's zebras left.

People in Kenya work hard to protect them. Some people count the zebras by taking photos of their stripes.

Grévy's zebra is endangered. In the 1970s there were about 15,000, but by 2018 only about 3,000 were left. People once hunted them for their meat and beautiful skins, and today growing numbers of livestock compete with them for grass and water.

Kenya banned hunting zebras in 1977. Today local scouts watch over the zebras, and in a big event called the Great Grévy's Rally, volunteers photograph every zebra they see so scientists can count them by their stripes.

The IUCN lists Grévy's zebra as Endangered (2016 assessment), with 1,956 mature individuals and a stable trend; the species is also on CITES Appendix I. The Grévy's Zebra Trust reports a decline from about 15,000 animals in the 1970s to about 3,042 in 2018, roughly 80 percent in four decades. Hunting for meat and skins drove early losses; competition with growing numbers of livestock for water and grazing, habitat loss and badly managed tourism remain threats.

Kenya banned zebra hunting in 1977 and the wildlife trade in 1978, and Ethiopia also protects the species. Community scouts patrol the rangelands, grazing projects with pastoralists aim to restore grass, and the Great Grévy's Rally, a citizen-science photo census first run in 2016, identifies individuals from their stripes.