Animal · Tanzania, Kenya, Botswana
Blue wildebeest
Connochaetes taurinus — the name this animal has in the language scientists everywhere share.
The blue wildebeest is a large grey antelope of the African grasslands, with curved horns, a dark mane and a shaggy beard. Huge herds walk hundreds of kilometres each year looking for fresh grass and rain. People also call it the gnu, after the grunting call it makes.
Picture credit: Charles J. Sharp (CC BY-SA 4.0) · Josefito123 (CC BY 4.0) · Bernard DUPONT (CC BY-SA 2.0) · Wikimedia Commons
Where does the blue wildebeest live?
Home: Open grasslands and savannah in eastern and southern Africa.
In the wild it lives in these countries: Tanzania, Kenya, Botswana, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Angola.
Conservation status from the IUCN: not in danger.
The short profile
Fully grown: about 1.2 to 1.4 m tall at the shoulder. It weighs about 200 kilograms. On the menu: plants.
The story behind it
A blue wildebeest calf can stand within minutes of being born, and it runs with the herd the same day. It has to, because lions, hyenas and wild dogs all follow the herds. Wildebeest eat short grass and crop it low with a wide mouth that works like a lawn mower. Short grass grows best after rain, so the herds keep moving to wherever rain has just fallen. In the Serengeti and the Masai Mara more than a million wildebeest travel together in one huge loop each year, with zebras and gazelles alongside them. River crossings are the hardest part, because crocodiles wait in the water. In the breeding season males mark small patches of ground and grunt at each other across the boundary. Away from the migration many wildebeest live in smaller herds that stay in one area all year.
Find it on the globe
Blue wildebeest is there as a tiny animated figure that breathes and looks around. From far away the planet is only a blue ball; detail arrives as you zoom in, and this one appears once you are close enough. Open it on the globe.
It sits at its real coordinates, not near them — the same numbers listed in the facts above. Switch off the layer for this kind of place and it disappears again; the buttons for that are down the right-hand edge.
Questions children ask
Why do wildebeest walk so far?
They follow the rain. Fresh green grass sprouts where a storm has just passed, so a herd sets off again as soon as the grass around it has been eaten down.
Is a wildebeest a kind of cow?
It is an antelope, in the same family as cattle, goats and sheep. Males and females both grow horns, and unlike deer antlers those horns stay on for life.
What hunts a wildebeest?
Lions, spotted hyenas, leopards, cheetahs and wild dogs all hunt them, and crocodiles catch them at river crossings. A healthy adult kicks hard and often gets away.
Where these numbers come from
Every figure on this page was checked against public reference sources before publication. Where sources genuinely disagree, the text says so.
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