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| The Truth about Hyenas |
HYENAS have two niches in Africa. As
real animals, filling the night wit their maniacal
whoops and laughs, they hunt aggressively and are
confident enough to terrorize lions. As creatures of
myth, over the centuries they have generated
fantastic tales of depravity and horror. Until
modern times, reality and myth so commingled that
the hyena ranked as the most misunderstood and most
maligned animal in Africa.
The truth about
the hyena began to emerge in the 1970s out of the
observations of such pioneers in animal behavior
studies as Jane Goodall, Hugo Van Lawick, George B.
Schaller, and Hans Kruuk. What they saw dispelled
the basic myth that hyenas were only scavengers. The
researchers saw hyenas and lions compete as hunters,
and often steal each other's kills, with hyenas
often driving lions away from their own kills.
Hyenas, however, are not greedy; they take away only
what they need. |
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Hyenas shot 1 |
Hyenas shot 2 |
Hyenas shot 3 |
In Botswana's
Chobe National Park, hyena clans, sometimes
numbering as many as 40, have confronted
lion prides, not to compete over food but to
fight. Lions, in what appeared to be an
attempt to rid their territory of hyenas,
attacked the rivals. The lions killed--but
did not eat--the hyenas. Lionesses sought
the dominant female hyena.
The
family Hyaenidae encompasses four species:
the spotted, the brown, the striped, and
larvae. The most intensively studied is the
spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta), which
ranges in length from 35 to 64 inches and
weighs about 88 pounds, with females usually
longer and heavier than males. Spotted
hyenas roam savannas, desert, and
mountainsides either as hunters, running
down their prey like wolves, or as
scavengers, feasting on carrion. Hyenas can
go for several days without water. |
Their incredibly
strong jaws and digestive tracts can dispose
of entire corpses, including bones, hide,
and hair. A hyena can consume up to one
third of its body weight in one feeding
frenzy. Spotted hyenas hunt in packs,
typically chasing a herd of migrating
wildebeests until a weak or young one
falters, then pouncing on it and consuming
it on the spot. A chase may go on for a mile
or more, with hyenas achieving speeds of 25
to 30 miles per hour. Around a kill, hyenas
vocalize, their giggling and grolwing
inspiring the tag "laughing hyenas.� As many
as 80 hyenas live together in large clans,
which divide into packs. At the core of the
clan is a group of related females born into
the clan and forming a hierarchy. The
top-ranking female mates only with the
ranking member of the male hierarchy. Many
males, at sexual maturity, wander off to
join another clan. |
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