The Quagga Project likes to call their zebras “Rau quagga”, after the founder of the project Reinhold Rau. That is why I made the post Please don’t call it quagga. The advocates of the name “Rau quagga” state that it is O.K. to call the zebras that way because the “Rau” in “Rau quagga” underlines that they are different animals from the quagga. I, however, think it is not legitimate to call something that is not a quagga a “quagga”, with or without the “Rau” in front of it. Calling those zebras “Rau zebra” would be more adequate if the zebras of the Quagga Project need a name, because they are zebras in any case.
Names aside, I made a post on the differences between the quagga and other zebras not so long ago. I think it is time to have a look at the differences between the zebras of the Quagga Project and the quagga.
The Quagga Project focuses only on the pelage colour characteristics. The coat colour of the Quagga was variable to a certain degree. I tried to capture this diversity in a drawing, using the preserved quagga skins as a reference:
The quagga was variable in the extent of the striping, but there are some general differences between the quagga and the zebras of the Quagga Project.
The striping is supposed to link the zebras of the QP with the quagga, and indeed the amount of reduction of the striping that has been achieved is impressive, but there are some clear differences in the stripe pattern of the quagga and the zebras of the QP.
1) In many of the zebras of the QP the stripes on the neck alternate between broad, solid black stripes and faint, narrow stripes. This was not the case in the quagga. All quagga skins show that the quagga had exclusively broad, solid black stripes on the neck.
2) The stripes on the face of the zebras of the QP are very narrow, producing a broad white space between them. In the case of the quagga, the stripes on the face are rather broad, with only a narrow quite area in between them.
The second clear difference in coat colour between the zebras of the QP and the quagga is the base colour, i.e., the colour between the stripes on the trunk. In the quagga the base colour of the trunk was brown, sometimes more intense sometimes less intense, but always brown. The base colour of the trunk on the zebras of the QP has some brownish shade but is not nearly intense as in the quagga specimen documented. The QP is aware of that and hopes they will achieve that brown base colour in the future.
Another possible difference is the length of the mane. I have the suspicion that the quagga had a shorter mane than other plains zebras, based on the photographs and the preserved skins. The zebras of the QP have rather long manes compared to the documented specimen of quagga. This is only my suspicion; it would have to be verified by measuring the manes of the preserved quagga skins.
Another very important difference between the quagga and the zebras of the quagga project is the fact that the quagga does not share any mitochondrial haplotypes with the living plains zebra subspecies (see my article linked above). There is no reason to assume the case is any different in the zebras of the QP, so therefore the animals are also genetically different.
The quagga and the zebras of the QP are superficially similar because an amount of stripe reduction on leg and trunk has been achieved in the latter, but that is it. There is no justification for calling the zebras of the QP quagga or “Rau quagga”, they are simply plains zebras with a reduced stripe pattern. General differences, such as in the striping on the anterior part of the body or the lack of a brown base colour on the trunk will remain. The project hopes to achieve the brown base colour one day, but I wonder if this is possible without new mutations enabling an increased production of pigment on the trunk area.
I am writing this not in order to criticize the QP, not at all. I just think that we should always stay objective and should not declare the revival of an extinct animal that is still dead as a dodo based on superficial similarity. I am happy that there is the QP, because their zebras could be very useful for outbreeding with quaggas if one individual or a few individuals could be genetically resurrected using genome editing one day.
The aurochs "breeding back" programmes do not claim to be recreating actual aurochs but refer to "Heck cattle", "Tauros cattle" etc rather than e.g. "Heck aurochs". So similarly the "Rau quagga" should be called the "Rau zebra" or specifically the "Rau plains zebra".
ReplyDeleteMy issue with the Quagga project is that I think they might be using the wrong Zebra species for their breeding back program. I always doubted the use of the plains zebra already but now that you say that Quaggas had mitochondrial haplotypes that aren't found in the Plains Zebra it makes even more sense to me.
ReplyDeleteYes the Plains Zebra's binomial name is "Equus Quagga" but the Mountain Zebra "Equus Zebra" (E. Zebra Hartmanni & E. Zebra Zebra) shows more consistent browning of the white stripes, like the Quagga. The Quagga's range was also sympatric with the range of the Mountain Zebras. The Mountain Zebras and Quagga lived south of the Oranje (Orange) river, the Plain's Zebra (Burchell's Zebra subspecies) lives north of the Oranje Rivier.
Perhaps the Quagga formed a species continuum/clade with the Mountain Zebra and not the Plains Zebra.
The name Quagga is an onomatopoeia that some local African tribes used to indicate Zebras from any species because they all make the same sound. The Plains Zebra having "Quagga" in its binomial doesn't signify anything except the sound it makes and the name by which the locals introduced it to Europeans but it could be the source of the confusion?
Just like the Quagga, the Mountain Zebras were almost hunted to extinction. In the 50s there were only about 60 of these Zebras left, and now they have protected status with numbers rising again.
I feel like more genetic research to see whether the missing haplotypes are present in the Mountain Zebra subspecies.
The only incongruous feature these Zebras have is that the Cape Mountain Zebra (E. Zebra Zebra) has a dewlap (especially in males), Hartmann's Mountain Zebra also has dewlap but it tends to stay much smaller and is pretty much absent in females. There are no reports of dewlaps in the Quagga. But, maybe the different sizes in dewlaps between the subspecies shows there is variation possible. Or, perhaps some (not all) Quagga specimens did also have a dewlap. I always found that taxidermied Quaggas have a strange neck orientation and dimensions. It's almost like the taxidermists didn't know what to do with the extra skin.
Some of the Mountain Zebra specimens in the links below show browning on their body that, if you take the stripes away, looks similar to the body color of the Quagga. The Mt Zebra also tends to have short manes, a lot of browning on the face/muzzle and, denser striping on the neck. They don't have as much white between the black stripes (again, similar to the Quagga).
https://www.istockphoto.com/photo/endangered-cape-mountain-zebra-gm157461358-22272164
https://www.istockphoto.com/photo/hartmann-mountain-zebra-looking-towards-the-camera-gm814002582-131670279
https://stockagency.panthermedia.net/m/stock-photos/23407742/cape-mountain-zebra-in-grassland/
https://www.westerncape.gov.za/general-publication/cape-mountain-zebra
"My issue with the Quagga project is that I think they might be using the wrong Zebra species for their breeding back program. I always doubted the use of the plains zebra already but now that you say that Quaggas had mitochondrial haplotypes that aren't found in the Plains Zebra it makes even more sense to me."
DeleteThat's not what "does not share any mitochondrial haplotypes with the living plains zebra subspecies" means. It means that no living plains zebra populations have the same mtDNA sequences as "the quagga," as in, none can trace their maternal lineage to a quagga, meaning no recent gene flow (at least none detectable from looking at mtDNA alone).
There is no doubt whatsoever that the quagga was a plains zebra, because we have confirmed that with nuclear DNA. In fact, recent studies indicate that there may not be any valid subspecies of plains zebras, despite morphological variation throughout their range.
There's no reason to think they were actually mountain zebras. You're basing this all on very shaky morphological similarities you think are there, and not on anything real. These very small differences in morphology are often meaningless for zebra classification.
"Surprisingly, the population genetic structure does not mirror the morphology-based subspecies delineation, underlining the dangers of basing management units exclusively on morphological variation. We use demographic modelling to provide insights into the past phylogeography of the species. The results identify a southern African location as the most likely source region from which all extant populations expanded around 370,000 years ago. We show evidence for inclusion of the extinct and phenotypically divergent quagga (Equus quagga quagga) in the plains zebra variation and reveal that it was less divergent from the other subspecies than the northernmost (Ugandan) extant population."
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0453-7
Is possible revival european wild horse in the same way that quagga? Przewalsky horse has gene of iberian and european wild horse acordding with Librado et al. Always przewalsky can recover from extiction.
ReplyDeleteIt is not possible to revive the quagga that way.
Deletehttps://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220309111050.htm
ReplyDeleteThen, It is not possible resurrect any specie.
Not that way, correct.
Delete