Okapi (Okapia johnstoni): Facts About the Forest Giraffe

What does an okapi look like?

At first glance the okapi seems to be assembled from several animals. Its body is a deep, velvety chocolate or reddish brown, while the hindquarters and upper legs carry bold horizontal white stripes, and the lower legs are white with dark rings at the joints. The face, throat and chest are pale grayish white, and the large ears swivel independently to catch sounds in the dense forest.

The neck is long compared with most hoofed animals but far shorter than a giraffe’s. The back slopes gently down from the shoulders to the rump, the same general shape as a giraffe. The short, oily coat sheds rain, which is useful in one of the wettest forests in Africa.

Males have two short, skin-covered bony knobs called ossicones on the forehead, usually less than 15 cm (6 in) long, with bare tips that show where the skin has worn away. Females have no ossicones, only small whorls of hair. Unusually for a hoofed mammal, females are on average slightly larger and a little redder than males.

How big is an okapi?

An adult okapi stands about 1.5 m (5 ft) tall at the shoulder and measures about 1.9–2.5 m (6.2–8.2 ft) from nose to rump. It weighs roughly 200–350 kg (440–770 lb), so it is about as long as a horse but more lightly built.

Its relative the giraffe is in a different league: adult giraffes can stand 4.3–5.7 m (14–19 ft) tall and weigh several times as much. The okapi’s smaller, compact body is an advantage in thick undergrowth, where a tall animal could not move easily.

Is the okapi a giraffe or a zebra?

The okapi is a giraffid, not a zebra. Zebras belong to the horse family, which has a single hoof on each foot, while the okapi has split, two-toed hooves like a giraffe, deer or cow. The okapi and the giraffe are the only two living members of the family Giraffidae, and genetic studies suggest their lineages split roughly 11–12 million years ago.

Several features show the family link. Both animals have skin-covered ossicones, a long, dark, grasping tongue, and a pacing walk in which the front and back legs on the same side move together. The stripes are a case of similar patterns evolving separately. For the full story, read Is an okapi a zebra?

Where do okapis live?

Okapis live only in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), mostly in the dense rainforests north and east of the Congo River. Their range includes the Ituri Forest, home to the Okapi Wildlife Reserve, as well as areas such as Maiko National Park, with smaller populations recorded west and south of the river. They were once found in the Semuliki Valley of western Uganda but disappeared from there in the 20th century.

The okapi prefers closed-canopy forest at about 500–1,500 m (1,600–4,900 ft) above sea level. It feeds where sunlight reaches the ground, such as gaps left by fallen trees, and avoids swamps, open savanna and areas heavily disturbed by people. More detail is in Where do okapis live?

What do okapis eat?

The okapi is a herbivore and a browser, eating leaves rather than grass. It feeds on the leaves, buds and shoots of shrubs, small trees and vines in the understory, as well as ferns, fruit and fungi. Studies in the Ituri Forest have identified more than 100 plant species in its diet, some of which are poisonous to people, and no single plant dominates.

Like a giraffe, it wraps its long, prehensile tongue around a branch and strips off the leaves. The tongue is about 35–46 cm (14–18 in) long and is also used for grooming, including cleaning the eyes and ears. Okapis have been reported to eat mineral-rich clay from riverbanks, which may supply salts that are scarce in a diet of rainforest leaves.

As a ruminant, the okapi has a four-chambered stomach and chews the cud, bringing food back up to grind it a second time. It feeds mainly by day and spends much of its waking time walking its regular forest paths in search of good browse.

Behavior and communication

Okapis are mostly solitary and active mainly during the day, with some activity after dark. Adults meet mainly to mate, and mothers stay with their calves. Home ranges overlap: males range over larger areas, averaging about 13 km² (5 sq mi), while females use smaller ranges of a few square kilometers.

Because they live in thick forest, okapis rely more on smell and hearing than on long-distance sight. They mark their surroundings with urine and with secretions from scent glands on their feet, and they rub their necks on trees. Their eyes contain many rod cells, which help in dim light under the canopy.

Okapis are generally quiet. Known calls include a soft “chuff” used as a contact sound, a moan during courtship and bleats from distressed calves. Researchers recording zoo okapis have also reported very low-frequency calls between mothers and calves, some of them below the range of human hearing. If threatened, an okapi can kick hard and butt with its head.

Reproduction and life cycle

Okapis can breed at any time of year. Courting pairs circle, sniff and lick each other before mating. Pregnancy is long, about 14–15 months (414–493 days, averaging around 440 days), and a single calf is usually born, weighing 14–30 kg (31–66 lb).

The calf can stand within about 30 minutes of birth. For its first weeks it spends most of its time lying hidden in a “nest” in thick vegetation while the mother feeds nearby and returns to nurse it. Remarkably, young calves do not pass dung for their first month or two, which may help keep their hiding place from being sniffed out by predators.

Calves start eating solid food at about three months and are usually weaned at about six months, though they may suckle for up to a year. A male’s ossicones begin to grow within the first year. Females can breed from about one and a half to three years old, and males from about two to three years.

Lifespan, predators and threats

Very little is known about how long okapis live in the wild. In zoos they commonly live 20–30 years. The main natural predator is the leopard, which can take both calves and adults.

The far greater threat comes from people. The IUCN lists the okapi as Endangered and its population as decreasing; the species was moved up to this category in 2013 after evidence of steep declines. Major threats include:

• Habitat loss from logging, farming and the spread of settlements.
• Illegal mining for gold and coltan, which brings camps and hunting deep into the forest.
• Hunting with snares for bushmeat and skins, even though the okapi is fully protected by Congolese law.
• Armed conflict, as militia groups in eastern DRC make patrols and monitoring dangerous.

In 2012, armed poachers attacked the headquarters of the Okapi Wildlife Reserve at Epulu, killing several people and all 14 okapis kept at the station’s breeding center. No one knows exactly how many okapis remain, because they are so hard to see and count in dense forest.

Conservation and protection

The Okapi Wildlife Reserve, created in 1992 and covering about 13,700 km² (5,300 sq mi) of the Ituri Forest, was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1996. It holds one of the most important okapi populations, together with Maiko National Park and other protected areas.

Conservation groups such as the Okapi Conservation Project, founded in 1987, support rangers, monitoring and work with local communities, including the Mbuti people who have long shared the Ituri Forest with the okapi. Zoos in Europe and North America run coordinated breeding programs, with the international studbook kept by Antwerp Zoo in Belgium, and October 18 is celebrated as World Okapi Day to raise awareness.

Discovery and relationship with people

Okapis were familiar to the forest peoples of the Congo long before outsiders knew of them. European explorers in the late 1800s heard reports of a forest animal sometimes called the “African unicorn.” British colonial official Sir Harry Johnston obtained pieces of striped skin and later a skull, and in 1901 the species was formally described, at first as a new kind of horse, Equus johnstoni.

Studies of the skull soon showed it was a giraffid, and it was placed in its own genus, Okapia. The okapi is now a national symbol of the DRC and appears on the country’s banknotes. Antwerp Zoo displayed the first okapi in Europe in 1919, and today it is one of the most admired animals in zoos and a highlight of our list of animals that start with O.