An article in the upcoming issue of Smithsonian magazine sheds some new light on the much-maligned hyena. One of the more interseting tidbits is that a huge number of hyena fatalities, about 60% in some areas, are due to lion attacks. Indeed, the article notes that lions "go out of their way to kill hyenas." Famed primatologist Jane Goodall, who studied other of Africa's creatures to an extent, was surprised at "the viciousness, the seeming hatred" that lions display toward hyenas.
Of course, Goodall said seeming hatred because non-human animals cannot actually hate... or can they?
Why do lions kill hyenas? They don't eat them after killing them, so hunger's clearly not a motive. They'll attack and kill hyenas who are sitting around minding their own business; so the lions also are not acting in self-defense or in defense of their cubs. Neither does the killing of hyenas seem to have any bearing on a lion's social status in its pride.
So the question, from an evolutionary standpoint, is what sort of adaptation would cause one animal to expend energy to kill another animal when there's apparently no payoff? Or, is it possible that hyenas do, in fact, incite hatred in lions? Not hatred in a fully human sense, of course; but perhaps there is something about the smell or appearance of hyenas that triggers an emotional response in the lion brain, causing bloodlust and rage.
The best scientists in the field have nothing but tenuous hypotheses, so our guesses are as good as theirs. What do you make of this anomaly?
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Hyenas will often show up en masse to steal a lion's dinner, and will sometimes attack lion cubs. I'm guessing 'preemptive strike'. Lions that hunt often put themselves in mortal danger for their food, so any adaptation that would reduce the likelyhood of them taking risks for no gain would be beneficial.
Animals clearly feel something similar to human emotions. Though, like human reasoning versus animal reasoning, I'm guessing there is SOME difference between their form of emotions versus ours.
Of course, Goodall said seeming hatred because non-human animals cannot actually hate... or can they?
I'm sure there's at least one non-human animal who gets a macabre satisfaction in killing another animal.
And I say I'm sure because I am. It's the chimp, the animal Ms. Goodall's famously acquainted with.
Why do lions kill hyenas?
Several reasons really. Hyenas compete with lion prides for food, hyenas would eat lion cubs (as well as lions themselves) given the opportunity, and hyena packs are generally larger than lion packs.
Lions would see hyenas as a threat to their territory, especially since where one goes, so go others. You'd kill a rat if you saw it in your house/apartment right? Well, imagine if rats were pack animals and bigger than one of your kids.
Not to mention, lions are pretty big. I'm sure if a big male lion got a hold of a hyena it wouldn't last long.
so the lions also are not acting in self-defense or in defense of their cubs.
Well, given the territory thing, not too sure that's the case.
Or, is it possible that hyenas do, in fact, incite hatred in lions?
I wouldn't be surprised. They are locked in a competition for survival, and I do believe lions feel emotion. Don't know too much about lions, but I wouldn't be shocked if lions feel some sort of hatred towards hyenas, and some sense of satisfaction in killing them.
What you have to understand is this is not an illogical reaction. These are creatures that compete for food, and hyenas are scavengers, which means that anything that walks or crawls is food to them. The lions have all justification for hating hyenas.
I mean, how many wolves are there in the US? Used to be a lot, right? What happened to them? We killed them. Why? Because we were competing for space. Same thing.
As mentioned before lions and hyenas hunt the same prey and hyenas will steal lion's kills if they can. Hyenas also kill lion cubs when they are able to. Another factor is that lions are very territorial, so hyenas aren't just taking the lions' food, they're also invading the lions' domain.
IIRC, I saw a clip where a bunch of hyenas outnumbered a lion and snagged what the lion caught.
My guess is lions see them as competition, even if they aren't actively scavenging.
While it's true that hyenas sometimes steal a lion's prey, for the record, it's actually more common for lions to steal hyenas' prey. (Hyenas are capable hunters and, despite having a well-deserved reputation for their iron stomachs, carrion generally constitutes only 5% of their diet.)
Originally posted by lynxcat:
Seems pretty straightforward. Lions and hyenas hunt the same prey. Fewer hyenas means less competition for food.
Which is the reason that human cattle ranchers, thinking ahead, kill hyenas preemptively. But I was not aware that evolutionary processes themselves could have that kind of foresight. And if they can, and do, then why should scientists express any surprise at the lions' behavior? The fact is that, as a rule, predators do not kill animals unless they intend to eat them. We don't see owls of one species getting into dogfights with owls of another species in order to cut down on competition for mice; nor wolves actively hunting down coyotes; and even on the African savannah, where leopards and cheetahs also prowl, the animosity between lions and hyenas is unique.
Territorialism could also account for some of the kills, but hardly all; and again, generally, animals will settle territorial disputes with threatening gestures first, resorting to actual attack only if one party refuses to back down.
Personally, I'm of the belief that the lions do, in some fashion, truly hate the hyenas. Of course the reason or mechanism behind such hatred is a mystery... we have only recently really begun to understand the mechanics of human pyschology, and animal psychology is of a much lower priority (and greater difficulty) for research.
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It is because the Hyenas killed their king and tried to eat their prince.
Actually, studies recently have shown animals are very much capable of emotional repsonses we have attributed to being purely human. Mainy are even capable of reasoning. There are less diffeerences between us that we have been raised to think.
My guess is that there is some reason for this behavior that we have not observed.
There may be some lingering anti-hyena instincts in lions from an era when the relationship between hyenas and lions was different. Hyenas, or their predecessors, may have once been the dominant predator at one point and lions retain the instinct to kill them. Or perhaps it's a reaction to some pheromones that the hyenas are putting out.
Also, as PandasRpeople mentioned, hyenas do not actually steal the kills of lions. Hyenas are the ones who perform the kill. The lions then come in, chase away the hyenas, eat the meat, and then the hyenas come back after the lions have had their fill - to eat the leftovers of the prey that they chased down and killed.
Sakura - I rather strongly doubt that, but in the spirit of proper scientific procedure I propose an experiment. Find a lion who was raised in captivity (not too hard) and a hyena who was raised in captivity (quite a bit harder) and put them in adjoining cages. If the hyena provokes a reaction in the lion, we'll know that it's instinctual rather than emotional in a human sense.
The fact is that, as a rule, predators do not kill animals unless they intend to eat them.
Well, not apparently.
Territorialism could also account for some of the kills, but hardly all; and again, generally, animals will settle territorial disputes with threatening gestures first, resorting to actual attack only if one party refuses to back down.
Well, I'm not so sure lions go about their normal lives until a hyena passes by and then turn into those things from Resident Evil 4 and all attack mindlessly. We have to see how far out of their way a lion goes to attack hyenas. If it's just if they encroach on their territory, then it's definitely territorialism.
The thing is most animals don't have the size difference that lions and hyenas do. A male lion is about 350-500 pounds. A hyena isn't.
Personally, I'm of the belief that the lions do, in some fashion, truly hate the hyenas. Of course the reason or mechanism behind such hatred is a mystery... we have only recently really begun to understand the mechanics of human pyschology, and animal psychology is of a much lower priority (and greater difficulty) for research.
I don't think we know enough to even know if any of this is true or false or speculation or what. It'd help if you could actually link to the article if it is online.
Found a Youtube video. Like I said, I think the reason the lions kill hyenas so frequently is the fact that they can. They're just big enough to. Look at the size difference between the male lion and the hyenas. Also recognize that's why the male lion is that big, specifically to protect his pride from other male lions and hyenas.
The article I referred to isn't publically available yet (one of the few advantages I have working in a printing press). Anyways, the stuff about lions comprised a relatively small amount of the article; much more was devoted to the hyenas' complex and matriarchal social structure and their unusual sexual anatomy (the female hyena has a clitoris that appears much like a ***** and can even become erect; this fact probably accounts for much of the animal's notoriety, as natives believed that the hyenas were hermaphrodites that could practice witchcraft).
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The article I referred to isn't publically available yet (one of the few advantages I have working in a printing press). Anyways, the stuff about lions comprised a relatively small amount of the article; much more was devoted to the hyenas' complex and matriarchal social structure and their unusual sexual anatomy (the female hyena has a clitoris that appears much like a ***** and can even become erect; this fact probably accounts for much of the animal's notoriety, as natives believed that the hyenas were hermaphrodites that could practice witchcraft).
Yeah, actually, hyenas are pretty freaking awesome.
Looked up the sizes of hyenas. They're between 90-190 pounds. Compare again to the male lion, which is 330-530 pounds according to wikipedia, and the female lion which is around 270-400 pounds. So we're having territorial disputes between two creatures, one of whom is 3-5 times the size of the other.
After actually looking at several journal articles, I've found the following (with some simplifications):
1. Hyenas and lions overlap almost 60% in actual prey species, and almost 70% in preferred prey species.
2. Lions do kill hyenas to reduce food competition.
3. Hyenas have evolved adaptations such as mobbing to deal with lions.
These stand among many other interesting points, involving more complexity when actions are examined taking into account ecological ratios. Moreover, other animals like cheetahs and leopards have less similar dietary niches; and cheetahs, for instance, do perceive lions as competition threats, and avoid them.
I fail to see why you believe there to only be "tenuous hypotheses", or why evolutionary processes could not produce these effects.
I fail to see why you believe there to only be "tenuous hypotheses", or why evolutionary processes could not produce these effects.
Well, you did more research. I was just taking the word of an article in a respectable (but far from exhaustive) journal that indicated that the lions' motive for aggression was rather a mystery. Also, I never said that I thought evolutionary processes could not have produced such behaviors; but only that the usual biological imperatives (hunger, self-defense, social status) did not seem to account for them.
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Which is the reason that human cattle ranchers, thinking ahead, kill hyenas preemptively. But I was not aware that evolutionary processes themselves could have that kind of foresight.
...
The fact is that, as a rule, predators do not kill animals unless they intend to eat them.
You know what's the strangest thing? I just watched a video in my environmental science class called Eternal Enemies: Lions and Hyenas from National Geographic. What I discovered was that hyenas were really pertersome and annoying. For instance, a male lion would go about marking his scent to declare his territory and the hyenapack leader would just go on over and mark over where the male lion just marked. This irritates the lion and he'll easily go for the kill (multiple hyenas can kill a lioness but they are usually no match for an adult male lion).
What more, it's not just like the lions abuse the hyenas. They are constantly competing for the same prey... the hyenas even win occasionally. In one event, the lionesses hunted down a zebra and a pack of hyneas chased them up a tree. They also compete for water resources and the hyenas would not hesitate to kill a lion if they had the oppurtunity.
So the facts are, lions hate hyenas but for good reason. Part of the reasons why hyenas die are simply because they hate lions themselves and are stubborn enough to irritate beasts that are somewhat superior to themselves.
Well, you did more research. I was just taking the word of an article in a respectable (but far from exhaustive) journal that indicated that the lions' motive for aggression was rather a mystery. Also, I never said that I thought evolutionary processes could not have produced such behaviors; but only that the usual biological imperatives (hunger, self-defense, social status) did not seem to account for them.
I don't see why they wouldn't. Hyenas are pack animals. They compete with lions for food. They'd also kill lions if they had the chance, and certainly would kill lion cubs or injured lions given the opportunity. If they find themselves on the same hunting grounds as a pride of lions would (and given that lions move to go where food is, this is likely) and a lion gets a hold of one, he's going to take it out. Why not? Hyena'd do the same. They're not there to play together, they're there to survive.
While it's true that hyenas sometimes steal a lion's prey, for the record, it's actually more common for lions to steal hyenas' prey. (Hyenas are capable hunters and, despite having a well-deserved reputation for their iron stomachs, carrion generally constitutes only 5% of their diet.)
So, they share the same prey. It stands to reason that they'd try to kill each other (competition), right?
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Maybe the lion is mad because the hyenas collaborated with his uncle to kill his father.
Seriously, though, this is one of those evolutionary process things. While I can't prove it, a reasonable hypothesis would be that at some point in the evolution of lions, a lion was born with instincts that caused it to kill a hyena. The lion that killed hyenas was more competitive for food and mates than the hyena friendly, thus the hyena killing lion passed on its genes to make more hyena killing lions. Either lions developed the instinct to kill hyenas, or they developed some cognitive function that allows them to recognize hyenas as a specific threat. On the hyena's end, the results probably look pretty much the same.
Maybe the lion is mad because the hyenas collaborated with his uncle to kill his father.
Seriously, though, this is one of those evolutionary process things. While I can't prove it, a reasonable hypothesis would be that at some point in the evolution of lions, a lion was born with instincts that caused it to kill a hyena. The lion that killed hyenas was more competitive for food and mates than the hyena friendly, thus the hyena killing lion passed on its genes to make more hyena killing lions. Either lions developed the instinct to kill hyenas, or they developed some cognitive function that allows them to recognize hyenas as a specific threat. On the hyena's end, the results probably look pretty much the same.
Something like that, maybe. In any event, asking what goes on in a lion's head is a different question than asking why lions attack hyenas, if somewhat related insofar as seeing what aspect of a lion's cognition lends itself to hyena killing. To determine whether a lion "feels anger" towards a hyena, we would presumably determine whether the lion can feel anger in the first place.
Just as a layman's guess, I would say that the psychological mechanism by which an instinct to kill a competitor manifests itself is probably not dissimilar to human anger, hate, or jealousy. Put another way, the experiences we call "anger", "hate", and "jealousy" are probably the human manifestations of basic neurological tools prevalent throughout at least the portion of the animal kingdom with complex nervous systems.
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I bet they're similar. Probably more similar than we might care to admit - and even our faculties of reason too. (Though personally, it may only partly indicate that animal instincts are more complex - rather, more that we aren't so far derived from other animals. But maybe I'm too behaviouristepiphenominalist not sure what word I'm looking for here.)
Of course, Goodall said seeming hatred because non-human animals cannot actually hate... or can they?
Why do lions kill hyenas? They don't eat them after killing them, so hunger's clearly not a motive. They'll attack and kill hyenas who are sitting around minding their own business; so the lions also are not acting in self-defense or in defense of their cubs. Neither does the killing of hyenas seem to have any bearing on a lion's social status in its pride.
So the question, from an evolutionary standpoint, is what sort of adaptation would cause one animal to expend energy to kill another animal when there's apparently no payoff? Or, is it possible that hyenas do, in fact, incite hatred in lions? Not hatred in a fully human sense, of course; but perhaps there is something about the smell or appearance of hyenas that triggers an emotional response in the lion brain, causing bloodlust and rage.
The best scientists in the field have nothing but tenuous hypotheses, so our guesses are as good as theirs. What do you make of this anomaly?
My guess is lions see them as competition, even if they aren't actively scavenging.
"Sometimes, the situation is outracing a threat, sometimes it's ignoring it, and sometimes it involves sideboarding in 4x Hope//Pray." --Doug Linn
I believe animals are very much capable of emotion. Anyone who ever owned a dog will probably agree with me.
Animals clearly feel something similar to human emotions. Though, like human reasoning versus animal reasoning, I'm guessing there is SOME difference between their form of emotions versus ours.
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I'm sure there's at least one non-human animal who gets a macabre satisfaction in killing another animal.
And I say I'm sure because I am. It's the chimp, the animal Ms. Goodall's famously acquainted with.
Several reasons really. Hyenas compete with lion prides for food, hyenas would eat lion cubs (as well as lions themselves) given the opportunity, and hyena packs are generally larger than lion packs.
Lions would see hyenas as a threat to their territory, especially since where one goes, so go others. You'd kill a rat if you saw it in your house/apartment right? Well, imagine if rats were pack animals and bigger than one of your kids.
Not to mention, lions are pretty big. I'm sure if a big male lion got a hold of a hyena it wouldn't last long.
Well, given the territory thing, not too sure that's the case.
I wouldn't be surprised. They are locked in a competition for survival, and I do believe lions feel emotion. Don't know too much about lions, but I wouldn't be shocked if lions feel some sort of hatred towards hyenas, and some sense of satisfaction in killing them.
What you have to understand is this is not an illogical reaction. These are creatures that compete for food, and hyenas are scavengers, which means that anything that walks or crawls is food to them. The lions have all justification for hating hyenas.
I mean, how many wolves are there in the US? Used to be a lot, right? What happened to them? We killed them. Why? Because we were competing for space. Same thing.
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While it's true that hyenas sometimes steal a lion's prey, for the record, it's actually more common for lions to steal hyenas' prey. (Hyenas are capable hunters and, despite having a well-deserved reputation for their iron stomachs, carrion generally constitutes only 5% of their diet.)
Which is the reason that human cattle ranchers, thinking ahead, kill hyenas preemptively. But I was not aware that evolutionary processes themselves could have that kind of foresight. And if they can, and do, then why should scientists express any surprise at the lions' behavior? The fact is that, as a rule, predators do not kill animals unless they intend to eat them. We don't see owls of one species getting into dogfights with owls of another species in order to cut down on competition for mice; nor wolves actively hunting down coyotes; and even on the African savannah, where leopards and cheetahs also prowl, the animosity between lions and hyenas is unique.
Territorialism could also account for some of the kills, but hardly all; and again, generally, animals will settle territorial disputes with threatening gestures first, resorting to actual attack only if one party refuses to back down.
Personally, I'm of the belief that the lions do, in some fashion, truly hate the hyenas. Of course the reason or mechanism behind such hatred is a mystery... we have only recently really begun to understand the mechanics of human pyschology, and animal psychology is of a much lower priority (and greater difficulty) for research.
Actually, studies recently have shown animals are very much capable of emotional repsonses we have attributed to being purely human. Mainy are even capable of reasoning. There are less diffeerences between us that we have been raised to think.
There may be some lingering anti-hyena instincts in lions from an era when the relationship between hyenas and lions was different. Hyenas, or their predecessors, may have once been the dominant predator at one point and lions retain the instinct to kill them. Or perhaps it's a reaction to some pheromones that the hyenas are putting out.
Also, as PandasRpeople mentioned, hyenas do not actually steal the kills of lions. Hyenas are the ones who perform the kill. The lions then come in, chase away the hyenas, eat the meat, and then the hyenas come back after the lions have had their fill - to eat the leftovers of the prey that they chased down and killed.
Sakura - I rather strongly doubt that, but in the spirit of proper scientific procedure I propose an experiment. Find a lion who was raised in captivity (not too hard) and a hyena who was raised in captivity (quite a bit harder) and put them in adjoining cages. If the hyena provokes a reaction in the lion, we'll know that it's instinctual rather than emotional in a human sense.
This may help the discussion somewhat ; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_emotion
Well, not apparently.
Well, I'm not so sure lions go about their normal lives until a hyena passes by and then turn into those things from Resident Evil 4 and all attack mindlessly. We have to see how far out of their way a lion goes to attack hyenas. If it's just if they encroach on their territory, then it's definitely territorialism.
The thing is most animals don't have the size difference that lions and hyenas do. A male lion is about 350-500 pounds. A hyena isn't.
I don't think we know enough to even know if any of this is true or false or speculation or what. It'd help if you could actually link to the article if it is online.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIVgKIuISx4
Found a Youtube video. Like I said, I think the reason the lions kill hyenas so frequently is the fact that they can. They're just big enough to. Look at the size difference between the male lion and the hyenas. Also recognize that's why the male lion is that big, specifically to protect his pride from other male lions and hyenas.
Yeah, actually, hyenas are pretty freaking awesome.
Looked up the sizes of hyenas. They're between 90-190 pounds. Compare again to the male lion, which is 330-530 pounds according to wikipedia, and the female lion which is around 270-400 pounds. So we're having territorial disputes between two creatures, one of whom is 3-5 times the size of the other.
Lion's going to win.
1. Hyenas and lions overlap almost 60% in actual prey species, and almost 70% in preferred prey species.
2. Lions do kill hyenas to reduce food competition.
3. Hyenas have evolved adaptations such as mobbing to deal with lions.
These stand among many other interesting points, involving more complexity when actions are examined taking into account ecological ratios. Moreover, other animals like cheetahs and leopards have less similar dietary niches; and cheetahs, for instance, do perceive lions as competition threats, and avoid them.
I fail to see why you believe there to only be "tenuous hypotheses", or why evolutionary processes could not produce these effects.
Well, you did more research. I was just taking the word of an article in a respectable (but far from exhaustive) journal that indicated that the lions' motive for aggression was rather a mystery. Also, I never said that I thought evolutionary processes could not have produced such behaviors; but only that the usual biological imperatives (hunger, self-defense, social status) did not seem to account for them.
so you'll forgive me if I've misunderstood.
What more, it's not just like the lions abuse the hyenas. They are constantly competing for the same prey... the hyenas even win occasionally. In one event, the lionesses hunted down a zebra and a pack of hyneas chased them up a tree. They also compete for water resources and the hyenas would not hesitate to kill a lion if they had the oppurtunity.
So the facts are, lions hate hyenas but for good reason. Part of the reasons why hyenas die are simply because they hate lions themselves and are stubborn enough to irritate beasts that are somewhat superior to themselves.
I don't see why they wouldn't. Hyenas are pack animals. They compete with lions for food. They'd also kill lions if they had the chance, and certainly would kill lion cubs or injured lions given the opportunity. If they find themselves on the same hunting grounds as a pride of lions would (and given that lions move to go where food is, this is likely) and a lion gets a hold of one, he's going to take it out. Why not? Hyena'd do the same. They're not there to play together, they're there to survive.
So, they share the same prey. It stands to reason that they'd try to kill each other (competition), right?
"Sometimes, the situation is outracing a threat, sometimes it's ignoring it, and sometimes it involves sideboarding in 4x Hope//Pray." --Doug Linn
I think the key question here is what's going on in the lions' heads that actually makes them do it.
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Seriously, though, this is one of those evolutionary process things. While I can't prove it, a reasonable hypothesis would be that at some point in the evolution of lions, a lion was born with instincts that caused it to kill a hyena. The lion that killed hyenas was more competitive for food and mates than the hyena friendly, thus the hyena killing lion passed on its genes to make more hyena killing lions. Either lions developed the instinct to kill hyenas, or they developed some cognitive function that allows them to recognize hyenas as a specific threat. On the hyena's end, the results probably look pretty much the same.
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Something like that, maybe. In any event, asking what goes on in a lion's head is a different question than asking why lions attack hyenas, if somewhat related insofar as seeing what aspect of a lion's cognition lends itself to hyena killing. To determine whether a lion "feels anger" towards a hyena, we would presumably determine whether the lion can feel anger in the first place.
candidus inperti; si nil, his utere mecum.
behaviouristepiphenominalistnot sure what word I'm looking for here.)