Zebras are iconic for their distinctive coats, but have you ever wondered whether zebras are white with black stripes or black with white stripes.

Despite these different patterns and coloring, all zebras have the same skin color: black, said Tim Caro, a behavioral and evolutionary ecologist and conservation biologist at the University of California, Davis.

Although zebras have black skin, different developmental processes determine their fur color, just like a light-skinned person can have dark hair, Caro said.

In fact, zebras actually have more light-colored hair than dark — their bellies are usually light — so it may seem that zebras are white with black stripes. .

This pigment is known as melanin; a lot of melanin leads to darker colors, like dark brown or black, while less melanin leads to lighter colors, such as hazel or blond, Live Science previously reported?

Zebras' black fur is chock-full of melanin, but melanin is absent from white fur, in essence, because the follicles that make up the stripes of white hair have "turned off" melanocytes, meaning they don't churn out pigment. ?

The production of melanin from melanocytes is "prevented during the development of a white hair, but not of a black hair," Caro told Live Science in an email.

In other words, for zebras, the animals' default state is to produce black hair, making them black with white stripes, according to Brittanica. .

So, why is the zebra black with white stripes.

"The okapi has similar stripes on the rump, but other than that, no other species has really distinct black and white stripes.