I Photographed A Zorse – The Hybrid Most People Don’t Think Exists (10 Photos)
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Last year, I met an animal which I thought would only exist in my fantasy: a zorse, the hybrid between a zebra stallion and a horse mare. Zuri, the mare you see in the photo, was only 1.5 years old and although I’ve been working as a photographer with horses for over 6 years, this was different from anything I’ve known so far.
The wild instinct is very strong in zorses and I had to rethink a lot of techniques to get the animal’s attention during the session. While a horse is a typical flight animal, a zorse is ready to fight. A horse is curious, a zorse doesn’t want to be bothered, which makes the interaction during photo sessions a challenge. In Africa, zorses are often bred to be trekking animals to transport people and goods through tough landscapes. They are strong, light-feed and very resistant to illness – they combine the best features of both a zebra and a horse.
Outside Africa, where I met this particular zorse, these hybrids are very rare and usually bred for simple lifestyle and visual reasons. Zuri is a sweet mare, with a flicker of wilderness in her eyes and I wanted to create photos that express the proud exotic miracle she is.
More info: Instagram
Proud crossbreed between a zebra and a horse
In the European jungle…
Do you see her marks? Just beautiful!
A sweet mare, as you can see from the soft look on her face
Making of
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Stunning - an absolutely gorgeous animal.
This comment has been deleted.
http://google.nl/url?q=https://www.laurierleweb.com/
This kind of hybrid is really a product of ill-conceived breeding for color. It's a wild animal and you are imparting traits that do nothing to improve the horse. I know it looks all "perty" but you are not doing anything but adding to the world of collectors. Ask anyone who works in a zoo, trimming hooves on zebras is dangerous at times. These crosses are not known for great behavior.
Although beautiful, the breeding done between horses and zebras is artificial and man-made, something that wouldn't really happen in nature, thus I don't completely agree with this /:
No "testing" on animals I'll bet, either!
And similar to the mule, zorses are born sterile
It's kind of surprising how few chromosomes zebras have, compared with horses. It almost seem to point to a genetic bottleneck far back in time, perhaps even a near-extinction.
I don't think bottlenecks cause fewer chromosomes. Just less variety in the genes.
That is exactly what a bottleneck is. We have fewer chromosome than chimpanzees despite outnumbering them in the billions. It's believe that it's because we nearly went extinct about 75,000 years ago and were down to a few thousand - maybe even a few hundred - individuals. So all 7 billion+ humans on the earth today are descended from that small handful of survivors.
You're very close, but bottlenecks only affect gene variety, not the number of chromosomes. It causes a gene restriction because the majority of the population dies and many genetic mutations are lost. The number of chromosomes for the species, which is how genetic material is stored in each body, remains the same.
@ 3ke :Since there are such things as Mule foals, that is untrue.
When you breed a horse and a donkey, you get a mule foal.
Mules are a cross between a female horse & a male donkey. Not an actual equine species, it's a man made hybrid.
Its mane looks like a mohawk :D
search up fjordhorses and be amazed.
Those are clipped, though. Fjord horses naturally have the same kind of mane as any other domestic horse.
Why did I get downvoted for pointing out that Fjord horse's manes are clipped??? It's the truth, they don't look like that naturally!
Oh my!, There are absolutely stunning!
They r my second favorite breed
Mohawk, what's that a cross between a Mole and a Hawk? I'm here all week.
pls just go now
You're not american, I assume
That gets cut when it begins to grow to avoid it being messy and impossible to comb when older. Tails also :)
Stunning - an absolutely gorgeous animal.
This comment has been deleted.
http://google.nl/url?q=https://www.laurierleweb.com/
This kind of hybrid is really a product of ill-conceived breeding for color. It's a wild animal and you are imparting traits that do nothing to improve the horse. I know it looks all "perty" but you are not doing anything but adding to the world of collectors. Ask anyone who works in a zoo, trimming hooves on zebras is dangerous at times. These crosses are not known for great behavior.
Although beautiful, the breeding done between horses and zebras is artificial and man-made, something that wouldn't really happen in nature, thus I don't completely agree with this /:
No "testing" on animals I'll bet, either!
And similar to the mule, zorses are born sterile
It's kind of surprising how few chromosomes zebras have, compared with horses. It almost seem to point to a genetic bottleneck far back in time, perhaps even a near-extinction.
I don't think bottlenecks cause fewer chromosomes. Just less variety in the genes.
That is exactly what a bottleneck is. We have fewer chromosome than chimpanzees despite outnumbering them in the billions. It's believe that it's because we nearly went extinct about 75,000 years ago and were down to a few thousand - maybe even a few hundred - individuals. So all 7 billion+ humans on the earth today are descended from that small handful of survivors.
You're very close, but bottlenecks only affect gene variety, not the number of chromosomes. It causes a gene restriction because the majority of the population dies and many genetic mutations are lost. The number of chromosomes for the species, which is how genetic material is stored in each body, remains the same.
@ 3ke :Since there are such things as Mule foals, that is untrue.
When you breed a horse and a donkey, you get a mule foal.
Mules are a cross between a female horse & a male donkey. Not an actual equine species, it's a man made hybrid.
Its mane looks like a mohawk :D
search up fjordhorses and be amazed.
Those are clipped, though. Fjord horses naturally have the same kind of mane as any other domestic horse.
Why did I get downvoted for pointing out that Fjord horse's manes are clipped??? It's the truth, they don't look like that naturally!
Oh my!, There are absolutely stunning!
They r my second favorite breed
Mohawk, what's that a cross between a Mole and a Hawk? I'm here all week.
pls just go now
You're not american, I assume
That gets cut when it begins to grow to avoid it being messy and impossible to comb when older. Tails also :)