Okapi Facts: The Rainforest Animal That Looks Like a Zebra and a Giraffe

Picture an animal with the striped legs of a zebra, the body of a horse, and the face of a giraffe. That's not a mix-up. That's a real animal called the okapi, and it's one of the strangest, shyest creatures walking through Africa's rainforests today. Here's what makes it so unusual, and why it's so hard to find in the wild.

The okapi (say it: oh-KAH-pee) is a forest-dwelling mammal native to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It's the closest living relative of the giraffe, and the only other member of the giraffe family still alive today. Scientists in the western world didn't know it existed until 1901, when British explorer Sir Harry Johnston sent striped skin samples back to Europe. Before that, it was known mainly through local Congolese knowledge and rumors of an African "forest unicorn."

Okapis have a dark reddish-brown coat, a long giraffe-like neck, and bold white stripes wrapping around their back legs and rear. Those stripes aren't for show. In the dim, dappled light of the rainforest floor, they break up the okapi's outline and mimic streaks of sunlight, which helps calves stay close to their mothers and keeps adults hidden from predators like leopards.

Since okapis borrow features from both animals, it's easy to assume they're related to zebras. They're not. Here's a quick side-by-side comparison.

Okapis live in one place and one place only: the Ituri rainforest in the northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. They favor thick canopy forest at elevations between roughly 1,600 and 4,900 feet, where dense plant growth gives them cover and food. About a fifth of this range now falls inside the Okapi Wildlife Reserve, a protected area recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Okapis are solitary and territorial. They mark their paths through the forest with scent from glands on their hooves, and they tend to freeze or slip away quietly rather than run when they sense danger. That habit, combined with the thick forest cover, makes them almost impossible to spot in the wild. Most of what researchers know comes from camera traps and tracking, not direct sightings.

Okapis are herbivores, and picky ones at that. They browse on leaves, shoots, buds, ferns, and fruit from more than 100 different plant species, including some that are toxic to humans and other animals. Their 18-inch tongue, the longest of any mammal relative to body size, lets them strip leaves off branches and even clean their own ears.

To round out their diet, okapis also eat reddish riverbed clay, which supplies minerals and salt that plants alone don't provide. Every so often, they'll eat bat droppings too, likely for the extra nutrients they contain.

Adult okapis stand about 5 feet tall at the shoulder and typically weigh between 450 and 800 pounds. Males have short, skin-covered horn-like bumps called ossicones on their heads, similar to a giraffe's but much smaller. Females don't have true ossicones, which is one of the easiest ways to tell the sexes apart at a glance.

Okapi calves are born after an unusually long pregnancy of about 440 to 450 days, nearly 15 months. A newborn weighs 30 to 66 pounds and spends its first few weeks hidden in dense brush while its mother forages nearby, only returning to nurse. This "hider" strategy keeps the vulnerable calf safe from predators during its most fragile stage.

Yes. The IUCN Red List classifies the okapi as endangered, and the population trend is going the wrong way. Because the Ituri rainforest is so remote and difficult to survey, nobody has an exact count. Estimates vary widely, from a few thousand to as many as 35,000, but most researchers agree numbers have dropped significantly over the past two decades.

The biggest threats are habitat loss from logging and farmland expansion, illegal hunting for bushmeat and hides, and illegal mining. In parts of the okapi's range, armed groups operating in and around protected areas have also made conservation and monitoring work more dangerous and difficult. The Okapi Conservation Project, founded in 1987, works directly with local communities and park rangers to protect okapi habitat and reduce poaching.

• Okapis are the only living relative of the giraffe, and the two are the sole surviving members of the family Giraffidae.

• Their nickname, "forest giraffe," comes from their long neck, dark tongue, and giraffe-shaped face.

• An okapi may have appeared in ancient art as far back as the 5th century BCE, possibly depicted on a carving at Persepolis as a gift from Africa.

• Each okapi's stripe pattern is unique, a bit like a human fingerprint.

• Okapis can live up to 30 years in professional care, such as accredited zoos and conservation centers.

The okapi proves that the animal kingdom still has surprises hiding in plain sight, or in this case, hiding in one of the densest rainforests on Earth. It took western science until 1901 to even confirm it was real. Protecting the Ituri rainforest isn't just about saving one unusual animal; it's about keeping an entire ecosystem intact for the species that depend on it, okapis included.

🌍 National Geographic – Okapi Profile

Explore more about the okapi from National Geographic's comprehensive animal encyclopedia.

✓ Species information • Habitat • Conservation status • Photos & videos

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