(Equus quagga)
Seneca Park Zoo is home to three female plains zebra, Lydia, Liberty, and Dottie. Lydia is five years old and came to the Zoo in November 2018 from Columbus Zoo. Liberty and Dottie arrived together in September 2018 from Hemker Park & Zoo. They share their habitat, located in the Animals of the Savanna area, with the Masai giraffes.
International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List status: Near Threatened due to hunting for their skins/fur, especially when they are located out of protected areas. Fencing around agriculture and protected areas block zebra migration corridors, affecting their ability to obtain crucial resources and escape predators.
Plains zebra live in savannas, steppes, and woodlands in southern Ethiopia to northern South Africa, throughout most of the eastern side of the Nile River.
Zebras mainly feed on grass, but sometimes eat shrubs, twigs, bark and leaves.
Each zebra has a unique stripe pattern, helping them to identify each other.
Zebra stripes are thought to create motion camouflage, a method of confusing predators. When a herd of zebras move in multiple directions, their stripes add to the confusion by creating optical illusions.
The quagga, an extinct subspecies of the plains zebra, only had stripes on its neck and head. The body was plain and resembled that of a horse.