The quagga ( Equus quagga quagga), a distinctive subspecies of the plains zebra, was once a common sight across the South African veld. Famous for its unique coat pattern—striped only on the head, neck, and forequarters—its complete disappearance in the 19th century highlights the devastating impact of colonial settlement on native wildlife. The factors that led to its complete disappearance in the 19th century highlight the impact of colonial settlement on native wildlife. Its trajectory from vast herds to total extinction was rapid, driven by economic exploitation and land-use changes.
The Quagga’s Identity and Range
The quagga was taxonomically classified as a subspecies of the plains zebra (Equus quagga), a designation confirmed by mitochondrial DNA analysis in 1984. This animal was physically striking due to its partial striping, which was bold and black-brown on the head, neck, and shoulders. The stripes gradually faded along the mid-section, eventually giving way to a plain, unstriped reddish-brown coat on the hindquarters and legs.
The quagga’s historical range was confined to the dry grasslands and arid interior scrubland of the Karoo region in South Africa, primarily south of the Orange River. This limited geographical distribution, which included parts of the Cape Province and the southern Orange Free State, made the subspecies particularly vulnerable to localized pressures. As a grazer, it lived in herds, often numbering between 30 and 50 individuals.
The Rapid Decline Due to Human Activity
The quagga’s demise was triggered by two interwoven forces originating from the European settlement of the Cape Colony. Settlers viewed the abundant quagga as a resource to be exploited and a competitor to be eliminated. This perception led to a systematic campaign of eradication that quickly decimated the wild population.
Overhunting and exploitation played a significant role in the quagga’s rapid decline throughout the 18th and 19th centuries. Quaggas were shot for their meat, which was used to feed farm laborers. Crucially, their durable hides were highly valued and commercially traded for use in making leather goods and grain bags.
Habitat destruction and competition with domestic livestock provided the second major blow. The fertile grasslands that the quagga relied upon for grazing were highly desirable for agricultural expansion by the settlers. Vast tracts of the Karoo were converted into farms for grazing domestic sheep and cattle. The quagga became a perceived pest that directly competed with the settlers’ livestock for forage and water resources. Farmers systematically hunted the zebras to clear the grazing land, leading to their swift removal from most of their historical range.
The Timeline of Final Extinction
The quagga had largely vanished from the wild by the 1850s. The last significant wild population was restricted to the Orange Free State, where hunting pressure continued unabated. The last known wild quagga was shot sometime in the late 1870s, likely around 1878, marking the end of the subspecies in its natural habitat.
A few individuals survived in captivity, primarily in European zoos, but breeding programs were largely unsuccessful in establishing a viable captive population. The final extinction occurred on August 12, 1883, when the last known captive quagga, a female, died at the Natura Artis Magistra zoo in Amsterdam. This event did not register as the final extinction at the time, partly because the term “quagga” was sometimes used indiscriminately for any zebra.
Modern Efforts to Resurrect the Quagga
The Quagga Project was launched in South Africa in 1987. This initiative, inspired by the finding that the quagga was a subspecies of the plains zebra, aims to reverse the extinction through a process of “breeding back.” The project uses selective breeding of Plains Zebras, choosing individuals that exhibit ancestral quagga traits such as reduced striping on the hindquarters and a brownish base color.
The goal is to concentrate the genes responsible for the quagga’s distinctive appearance that are still present, though diluted, in the modern plains zebra gene pool. The offspring exhibiting the desired phenotype are known as “Rau Quaggas,” named after the project’s founder, Reinhold Rau. The objective is to produce a population visually and genetically similar enough to the original quagga for reintroduction into their historical range in the Karoo.