Horse + Zebra = “Zorse”

July 18, 2007 · Filed Under Science, Technology

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Meet Eclyse – an animal that looks like it was assembled in one of those dodgy garages where they weld halves of two stolen cars together.

But Eclyse isn’t the result of some crazed Doctor Dolittle with a god complex. It’s a zorse – a zebra/horse hybrid, born on a ranch in Germany. And she’s the product of a holiday romance.

While most zorses have stripes across their whole body, Eclyse only has two blocks of stripes – on her face and her rear.

The pure white areas she gets from her mother, a horse called Eclipse. Eclipse’s owners sent her to a ranch in Italy for a while – where she met a rugged, handsome zebra called Ulysses.

One thing led to another – and when she got back home to Germany, Eclipse surprised her keepers by producing a little half-horse, half-zebra with highly unusual markings.

Ranch spokesman Udo Richter commented: ‘You can tell she is a mix just by looking at her. But in temperament she can also exhibit characteristics from each parent.

‘She is usually relatively tame like a horse but occasionally shows the fiery temperament of a zebra, leaping around like one.’

[Metro UK]