We learnt at Physics a few days ago that animals adapt to their environment. They are coloured so as to hide from their enemies and hunt their food more easily.
The polar wolf, for instance, is white to hide and hunt in the snow.
But why are zebras striped?
What does that pattern help them for?
Some scientists believe that they have found the answer...
According to their research, zebras have evolved and acquired these stripes in order to prevent insects from biting them!!
As scientists point out, the key is in the way light is reflected. "At first we studied horses with black, brown and white hair.", Susanne Akesson notes. "We noticed that the light that is reflected by black and brown horses gathers more flies than that of the white ones."
Having discovered flies'...preferences, scientists continued their research on zebras. "We created an experimental environment out of surfaces in various patterns.", Akesson reports and goes on to explain how they put a black board, a white one and lots of black and white ones in different sizes in a horse farm in Hungary.
"We had put glue on the boards. So we measured the insects that got stuck on the boards.", she adds. The black and white board attracted fewer flies even than the white one. A similar experiment was carried out with 3D effigies of two horses (a black and a white one) and of a zebra. The results were the same...
Original post by Dimitris Alexakis
