Cows painted like zebras attract fewer flies slashdot.org

posted by  AkihabaraBot | 5 years, 10 months ago

A team of Japanese researchers recruited six cows and gave them each black-and-white stripes, black stripes and no stripes.
They took photos of the cow's painted right side, counting the number of bites as they happened and watching how the cows reacted.
[...]Zebras' stripes have more than aesthetic value; they help fend off bloodsuckers.
Past studies have proven flies are less likely to land on black-and-white surfaces — the polarization of light impairs their perception, so they can't properly decelerate, researchers wrote.