Camera Critters: Okapi

I've previously shared with you the beautiful Okapi at the Houston Zoo.
Not long ago, I was fortunate enough to meet Kwame in a behind the scenes tour.

The Okapi has always been my favorite animal at the zoo.

It is a beautiful and unusual looking animal.
Shy, graceful, magical!

With the stripes (great camouflage) the Okapi looks like he might be related to the zebra.
Looking at his face, you can see the resemblance to the giraffe and indeed,
the Okapi is the only living relative of the giraffe.
Like the giraffe, the Okapi has big ears (better to hear you coming) and a long dark prehensile tongue.
The tongue feels like sandpaper -- great for stripping leaves from trees,
not so great for kissing humans!
The tongue is long enough to clean his eyelids and ears!
Only the males have the horns (ossicones).

They are a solitary and shy animal.
Their home is the dense Ituri Rainforest in the Congo.
Their fur feels like velvet and is also quite oily providing them with a natural raincoat.
Petting an Okapi will turn your hand red from the oil on the coat.

They are a threatened animal and I can't imagine Mother Earth without this gorgeous creature.

Thank you to Misty for hosting Camera Critters.

Wishing YOU well, much joy and a magical weekend!

Camera Critters

Misty is our wonderful hostess for Camera Critters.
Be sure to go and visit.

Today I want to show you the portrait of the animal I fell in love with many years ago on my very
first visit to the Houston Zoo-
the beautiful and shy Okapi.

The okapi (pronounced oh-COP-ee) is an unusual animal. With its white-and-black striped hindquarters and front legs, it looks like it must be related to zebras! But take a look at an okapi’s head and you’ll notice a resemblance to giraffes.

The okapi is indeed the only living relative of the giraffe. Like giraffes, okapis have very large, upright ears, which catch even slight sounds, helping them to avoid trouble. They also have long, dark prehensile tongues, just like a giraffe’s, to help them strip the buds and young leaves from the understory brush of their rain forest home.

Okapis are hard to find in the wild. Their natural habitat is the Ituri Forest, a dense rain forest in central Africa (northeast region of Democratic Republic of Congo - formerly Zaire). Okapis are very wary, and their highly developed hearing alerts them to run when they hear humans in the distance. In fact, while natives of the Ituri Forest knew of okapis and would occasionally catch one in their pit traps, scientists did not know of the animal until 1900. The secretive nature of okapis and the difficulty most humans have of traveling in their habitat have made okapis hard to observe in the wild. Therefore, researchers can only estimate how many okapis live there. It is believed that there are currently about 25,000 okapis in the wild.

The okapi’s dark purplish or reddish brown fur feels like velvet. It’s also oily, so water slides right off, keeping the okapi dry on rainy days. Only the males have horns, which are covered by skin and are short so they won’t get tangled in forest branches.

The changing politics of central Africa and the continued loss of habitat threaten the beautiful okapi. Fortunately, in 1952, one-fifth of okapi habitat in Africa’s Ituri Forest was set aside as a wildlife reserve. The Okapi Wildlife Reserve, with support from zoos and conservation organizations, and the local people, continues to protect and to support study of this rare and unusual forest dweller.

Happy Camera Critters!

(Information about the Okapi from the San Diego Zoo.)