living in cape town

Hello Sailor on Lower Main Road in Observatory does one hell of a vegetarian breakfast in one hell of a beautiful space for R30

Cape Mountain Zebra

The Cape mountain zebra, Equus zebra zebra, is a subspecies of the mountain zebra, named for the Cape Province of South Africa and found in the Western Cape and eastern Cape areas. They mainly eat grass but if little food is left they will eat bushes.

Its broad black stripes are closely spaced on a pure white body. Overall it is stockier than the Hartmann’s subspecies, has longer ears, and has a larger dewlap.

Mountain zebras associate in small groups. Two types of groups can be distinguished, namely family groups and bachelor groups. A family group consists of a mature stallion and between one and five mares (usually two or three) and their offspring. Those stallions that cannot obtain mares associate in loose bachelor groups. The members of a family group normally stay together for many years. One stallion in the Mountain Zebra National Park, born in 1959, established himself as a herd stallion in 1965 and was still with the same mares fifteen years later.

The Cape mountain zebra formerly inhabited all the mountain ranges of the southern Cape Province of South Africa. By 1922, however, only 400 were believed to survive. To counteract the continued decline, Mountain Zebra National Park was established in 1937on acacia veld near Cradock, South Africa, but its small population of Cape mountain zebra became extinct in 1950. That same year reintroductions from nearby remnant populations began.

Eleven animals were donated from a nearby farm in 1950, and in 1964 another small herd was added. By the late 1960s, the total Cape mountain population was only 140 but grew to 200 by 1979, with 75 percent of the animals in Mountain Zebra National Park. In 1984, the population was back to 400 head. Since then a few zebras have been reintroduced to the Cape Point Section of Table Mountain National Park.

There are currently 5 cape Mountain Zebra at Cape Point, two males and three females, one of which is still young. One of the males does not live with the family, and instead hangs out with the Bontebok. He has had a couple of nasty injuries which I gather he got from the other male, one of which resulted in bad damage to his tail, necessitating amputation.