Animals That Start With Z: Zebra, Zebu, Zorilla and More

Zander

The zander, also called the pikeperch, is a large predatory fish of the perch family. It is native to rivers and lakes draining into the Baltic, North, Black, Caspian and Aral seas, and people have introduced it farther west, including to England in 1878. Adults are usually 40–80 cm (16–31 in) long. Its large, glassy eyes help it hunt smaller fish in murky water and at dusk, and its close North American relative is the walleye.

Zebras: plains, Grévy’s and mountain

There are three living zebra species, all wild members of the horse family found only in Africa. Each zebra’s stripes are unique, like a fingerprint, and the best-supported explanation for them is that they deter biting flies; why do zebras have stripes? explains the evidence.

Plains zebra

The plains zebra is the most common species, with roughly 500,000 animals on the grasslands of eastern and southern Africa, from South Sudan and Ethiopia to South Africa. It weighs about 175–322 kg (386–710 lb), has broad stripes and lives in family groups led by a stallion. It is the zebra of the great Serengeti migration and is listed as Near Threatened.

Grévy’s zebra

Grévy’s zebra is the largest wild member of the horse family, weighing 350–450 kg (770–990 lb). It has very narrow stripes, a white belly and big, rounded ears, and it can go up to five days without drinking. It lives in the semi-arid scrub of northern Kenya and Ethiopia. Its numbers crashed from about 15,000 in the 1970s to only a few thousand today, and it is listed as Endangered.

Mountain zebra

The mountain zebra lives on rugged slopes and plateaus in South Africa, Namibia and southwestern Angola. It weighs about 204–372 kg (450–820 lb) and has a fold of skin called a dewlap on its throat, a white belly and a grid-like stripe pattern on its rump. The Cape subspecies was once hunted almost to extinction but has recovered in reserves such as Mountain Zebra National Park. The species is listed as Vulnerable.

Zebra duiker

The zebra duiker is a small forest antelope of West Africa, found mainly in Liberia and also in Côte d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone and Guinea. Its golden to reddish-brown coat carries 12–16 dark stripes across the back, which may help break up its outline in the dim forest. It stands about 45 cm (18 in) at the shoulder and weighs up to about 20 kg (44 lb). Forest loss and heavy hunting for bushmeat have made it Vulnerable.

Zebra finch

Zebra finches are small, seed-eating birds with a bright orange-red bill. Males have orange cheek patches and fine black-and-white bars on the throat, the “zebra” markings of the name. Scientists now recognize two species: the Australian zebra finch, found across most of inland Australia, and the Sunda zebra finch of the Lesser Sunda Islands, including Timor. Young males learn their song by copying an adult tutor, which has made the zebra finch one of the most studied birds in research on how brains learn sounds. Most live only 2–3 years in the wild.

Zebra longwing

The zebra longwing is a butterfly with long, narrow black wings crossed by pale yellow stripes. It lives from South and Central America north to southern Texas and peninsular Florida, and it has been Florida’s state butterfly since 1996. Unusually for a butterfly, the adults eat pollen as well as nectar, which helps them build chemicals that make their bodies distasteful to predators. At night, groups of up to 60 adults roost together on the same branch.

Zebra moray

The zebra moray is an eel of tropical reefs from the coast of East Africa and the Red Sea across the Indian and Pacific oceans to Hawaii, the Galápagos and the Pacific coast of the Americas. Thin white rings circle its dark brown body. Unlike most morays, which catch fish with sharp fangs, it eats only hard-shelled prey such as crabs, sea urchins and mollusks, crushing them with blunt teeth. It is usually about 50 cm (20 in) long, with a reported maximum of 150 cm (59 in).

Zebra mussel

The zebra mussel is a small freshwater mussel, usually about the size of a fingernail and at most about 5 cm (2 in) long, often with zigzag dark stripes on its shell. It is native to the Black Sea and Caspian Sea region of southeastern Europe and southwestern Russia. Carried in ships’ ballast water, it reached North America in the 1980s and was found in Lake St. Clair, between Michigan and Ontario, in 1988. Dense colonies now coat rocks, pipes and other mussels in the Great Lakes, and it is considered one of the world’s most damaging invasive aquatic species.

Zebra shark

The zebra shark is a slow, harmless carpet shark of coral reefs and sandy flats in the tropical Indian and Pacific oceans, growing to about 2.5 m (8.2 ft). Its name comes from the young, which have pale vertical stripes on a dark brown body; adults are pale with dark spots, so divers often call them leopard sharks. It rests on the seabed by day and searches reef crevices for snails, clams, crabs and small fish at night. In 2017, scientists reported that a female in an Australian aquarium had produced young without mating, a rare process called parthenogenesis. Heavy fishing across much of Asia has made it Endangered.

Zebra spider

The zebra spider, or zebra jumping spider, is a tiny black-and-white spider just 5–9 mm (0.2–0.35 in) long. It is common on sunny walls, fences and windowsills across Europe, North America and northern Asia. Instead of building a web, it stalks small insects with its large forward-facing eyes and leaps onto them, trailing a silk safety line. It is harmless to people.

Zebrafish

The zebrafish is a small striped minnow, about 2.5–4 cm (1–1.6 in) long, from the streams, ponds and rice paddies of South Asia, including India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Pakistan. Its see-through embryos develop outside the mother’s body and hatch within a few days, which has made it one of the most important animals in genetic and medical research. Zebrafish can regrow damaged fins, heart muscle and parts of the retina, and scientists study this ability to learn more about healing. In the aquarium trade it is sold as the zebra danio.

Zebu

The zebu is a type of domestic cattle with a fatty hump over the shoulders, loose skin hanging under the throat and often drooping ears. It was domesticated in South Asia, probably in the Indus Valley region around 8,000 years ago, and it copes with heat, humidity and ticks far better than European cattle. Zebu and zebu crosses are now raised throughout the tropics, from India and Africa to Brazil, and the American Brahman breed was developed from imported zebu. In India, cattle hold a special place in Hindu tradition.

Zokor

Zokors are burrowing rodents of China, Kazakhstan and southern Siberia. They look like plump moles, with tiny eyes, no outer ears and powerful front claws that they use to dig long tunnel systems. They rarely come above ground and feed on roots, tubers and seeds. Their closest relatives are the blind mole-rats and bamboo rats rather than hamsters or voles, as scientists once thought. On the high grasslands of the Tibetan Plateau, the mounds of soil pushed up by the plateau zokor are a familiar sight.

Zone-tailed hawk

The zone-tailed hawk is a dark, medium-sized hawk found from southern Arizona, New Mexico and western Texas south through Mexico and Central America into South America. In flight it looks remarkably like a turkey vulture, holding its long wings in a shallow V and rocking from side to side, and it often soars among vultures. Many ornithologists think this resemblance lets it approach lizards, birds and small mammals that pay no attention to harmless vultures. Its name comes from the pale bands, or zones, across its black tail.

Zorilla

The zorilla, or striped polecat, is a black-and-white member of the weasel family from the savannas, grasslands and dry scrub of sub-Saharan Africa. It looks and behaves much like a skunk: when threatened, it arches its back, raises its tail and sprays a foul-smelling, irritating fluid from glands near its tail. Its body is 30–38 cm (12–15 in) long, not counting the bushy tail. It hunts at night for insects, mice and small reptiles, and predators rarely bother it.

Zorses, zonkeys and other zebra hybrids

Zebras can breed with horses and donkeys, though this happens almost only in captivity. A zorse is the offspring of a zebra stallion and a horse mare, while a zonkey is a cross between a zebra and a donkey. These hybrids usually have stripes on their legs or body, and, like mules, they are almost always sterile, so they are not separate species.

Why so many Z animals are named after zebras

Few English words begin with Z, so many animals with Z names are named after the zebra’s bold stripes. The zebra shark, zebra finch, zebra mussel and zebra spider are not related to zebras at all. The word “zebra” itself reached English around 1600 from Italian or Portuguese, probably from an old Iberian name for the wild ass. “Zorilla” comes from the Spanish word for a little fox, and “zander” comes from German. For more animal names, see animals that start with Y or go back to the beginning with animals that start with A.