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Spotted Hyena (Crocuta crocuta)

THE LARGER CARNIVORES

Most people share mixed feelings of fascination and disdain for hyenas, whose appearance with large rounded ears and a sloping back angling down from high shoulders to somewhat lower buttocks, is not particularly appealing. The thickset body is covered in a shaggy yellow-brown coat, blotched with black and dark brown spots.

Although hyenas live mostly by scavenging on the leftovers of animals killed by lions and other carnivores, they occasionally hunt and kill their own prey, and sickly animals or recently born infants are particularly susceptible.

Their large heads are so well supplied with thick muscles that it is easy to accept the commonly held belief that the hyena has the most powerful jaws of any animal of comparable size. With these jaws it can snap and crush bones with great ease; even tins, tyres and shoes inadvertently left outside camp are mangled almost beyond recognition.

Hyenas are fairly common throughout the Park, but are seldom seen as they spend their days resting in drain-pipes or tunneled bur rows. They tend to live in groups of up to ten, but are usually seen alone or as pairs. At night they emerge to look for food and water, of ten going hungry or having to cover great distances before finding something to eat.

Their melancholy and eerie nocturnal howls are commonly heard from most of the tourist-camps. Most familiar is the drawn-out 'Hooo eeee-0000'  which may change over to frightful high-pitched cackles or screams. It is one of the most characteristic of African sounds.

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