Friday, August 29, 2008 10:20 AM CDT

ST. LOUIS (AP) — The St. Louis Zoo’s newest addition is a 105-pound baby zebra.

The birth of the male Grevy’s zebra was announced Thursday, a week after he was born. It is named Kalama (ka-LAH’-ma) after a community in northern Kenya.

Kalama is the first offspring of the 5-year-old mother Tiombe (tee-OHM’-bay) and the 32nd Grevy’s zebra born at the zoo. The father, Goro, has since died. Goro arrived in 1987 from a zoo in Czechoslovakia and sired 12 offspring.

The Grevy’s zebra, native to Kenya and Ethiopia, is endangered. In the last 30 years, the number of wild Grevy’s zebras has dropped from 15,000 to fewer than 2,200, mostly because of competition with livestock for food and water.

The zoo says the Grevy’s zebra is the largest of all zebras and has the narrowest body stripes.

 

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