Why the zebras got their stripes

Information from an article in the Journal of Experiemental Biology, as reported at Science Daily:

Horseflies (tabanids) deliver nasty bites, carry disease and distract grazing animals from feeding. According to Horváth, these insects are attracted to horizontally polarized light because reflections from water are horizontally polarized and aquatic insects use this phenomenon to identify stretches of water where they can mate and lay eggs. However, blood-sucking female tabanids are also guided to victims by linearly polarized light reflected from their hides...

The team then tested the attractiveness of white, dark and striped horse models. Suspecting that the striped horse would attract an intermediate number of flies between the white and dark models, the team was surprised to find that the striped model was the least attractive of all. Finally, when the team measured the stripe widths and polarization patterns of light reflected from real zebra hides, they found that the zebra's pattern correlated well with the patterns that were least attractive to horseflies. 

That's one kind of zebra.  The other kind are the referees at various sporting events; their evolution was explained eight years ago in a column at Slate:

According to an article from the archives of the conceptually brilliant Referee magazine, the striped design was the brainchild of one Lloyd Olds, a longtime high-school and college sports official from Michigan. The impetus for the idea came in 1920, when he was working a college football game while wearing a white shirt, which was customary at the time for officials in most sports. The visiting team wore white as well. At one point, the quarterback mistakenly handed off the ball to Olds. "Of course I dropped it," he later recalled, "and, thank goodness, he recovered same."..

The zebra look has infiltrated many other sports, including lacrosse, wrestling, and on at least one notable if atypical occasion, boxing. The big exception, of course, is baseball, where umpiring attire has generally been rooted in prevailing menswear fashions. 

The article provides additional details on the history of referee uniforms in football, hockey, and basketball.  

p.s. - Is a zebra black with white stripes, or white with black stripes?

Top photo: © davy liger / Fotolia