Saturday night’s Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom question thread.
Lions are often referred to as the “King of the jungle”. What jungle did lions ever inhabit and when? I have never heard of a lion in any jungle, (unlike the tiger), so I’m just curious as to when this phrase originated and why. Seems “king of the beasts” is a good enough nickname, and more accurate too.
what is the evolutionary benefit of the thick fur of a lion (especially the mane on the male?) I can’t think of another big male cat that has a mane. I would think that would be something that evolution might want to lose, especially in the heat of Africa. I can perhaps see a benefit in fighting another cat or tackling an animal to eat… the fur would make it tougher to choke the lion or kill it by slicing the jugular, but since no other cat has this msne, I’m thinking this benefit is probably minimal.
Do Lions ever kill and eat hyenas, or do they just co-exist with them? And if not, why not? Lions are pack hunters and live in large prides… it’s not like they are cheetahs, which are solitary hunters for the most part and would not stand much of a chance against a hyena.
Lions don’t live in any jungles, and the modern species never has. In fact, the rainforest areas of central Africa (and deserts) are the only areas of the continent where you won’t find them, broadly speaking.
There are forest-dwelling lions, particularly in India where they have been hunted to extinction in open areas. No rainforest dwellers, though.
I suspect the “jungle” association comes from Tarzan, but I’ll leave the etymology to others.
Asiatic lions used to live in forests and jungles all over the place. Now you can only find them in the Gir Forest in India.
Wikipedia page on the Asiatic lion:
Not my field of expertise, but I’ve heard that it’s for sexual display, to make the lion appear larger than it is (intimidates competitors and other threats), and that it protects their neck in fights.
Lions do on occasion kill hyenas. Lions and hyenas often fight each other for kills, and as opportunistic predators both will steal food from the other if the opportunity presents itself. Because of this lions and hyenas rarely get along well together. More often they are fighting each other off over food.
Until the 19th century, jungle just meant “wilderness”. Until the late 20th century jungle just meant “dense vegetation” of the type usually associated with monsoon forest. It wasn’t until the 1950s sometime that jungle came to mean “rainforest”.
So yeah, by any normal definition, lions are commonly found in jungles and always have been.
As far as we can tell, it’s a threat display for intimidating other males.
It’s unlikely to be a sexual display because lionesses don’t actually have any say in their mating choices. Males fight for pride control and the females mate with the winner. Any female that refuses to mate with the male will either produce no cubs or have all her cubs killed at birth. Male sexual displays in such a social structure are utterly pointless.
The idea of the mane as a sexual display is also refuted by the existence of maneless lions. Based on cave art, European lions were all maneless and American lions also appear to have been maneless. Maneless lions are also relatively common in Africa today, and they become pride leaders proportional to their numbers or at a slightly higher rate, so having a mane is clearly not having any impact on their reproductive capabilities. Observations suggest that maneless lions are more frequently challenged by rival males and those challenges more frequently end in physical confrontation and the reign of a maneless lion is shorter. Maneless lions are also more likely to form group leaderships, with two males pairing up to defend a pride.
All of that indicates that the purpose of the mane is either as a threat display or a way of signalling health to rivals in order to *avoid *confrontation. That interpretation also neatly explains why only lions have manes, not lionesses or other big cats. Since other big cats don’t form harems and only mate seasonally, the need for a threat display is greatly reduced.
One alternative hypothesis is that manes evolved in response to human encroachment. A mane makes it harder for a a human to spear a charging lion by disguising the neck and chest target area. Thus the manes form of the lion evolved in Africa and spread outwards with humanity. That would explain why Mediterranean cave painting show maneless lions, yet by historical times Mediterranean lions were all maned: the maned form followed humans out of Africa. Of course that may just be coincidental timing, with the maned form spreading because of other evolutionary advantages unrelated to humans. But it’s an interesting idea.
While it is common to think of lions as African animals, they lived in Scotland, Russia, Canada, Mexico and Panama until we wiped them out just a few thousand years ago. So whatever selection pressure they may have been under it wasn’t just heat. They can clearly tolerate snow just as well as heat.
Constantly, and vice versa. Hyaena packs will kill lone lionesses if they possibly can, and lions kill every hyeana they can safely get their claws on. there’ no love lost between them.
Of course that’s not unique to lions and hyaenas. Lions are incredibly territorial and will kill *any *predator that they encounter: leopards, bears, foxes, hyaenas, jackals and so forth. The pack nature of hyaenas make them one of the few animals that can actually fight back against lions.
These ideas make sense, but as other male cats don’t have them, I would assume that male lions would work out the pecking order of who gets to mate with the females without the manes. If it is to make them sexually attractive to females, I can’t imagine that would matter much if another male kicked the crap out of him. It also makes some sense that it would make the lion’s head appear larger, helping intimidate a potential rival. However, I would think (just speculating here) that the amount of benefit they would enjoy from not having that fur to roast under during the african day would outweigh the other benefits we are speculating on.
I would think (although I’ve not read anything on this) that the lions would go after the hyena babies, not necessarily the larger hyenas. Even if the lion has numbers and weight advantages in a particular encounter, the hyena’s jaw strength and bone crushing abilities keeps many lions from risking a direct confrontation, since even if the hyena loses, they can inflict serious damage on the lion. They would also have the potential to kill with a well placed bite, so for both sides, a risky proposition to go after adults. But killing each other’s cubs would make a lot of sense, and I would think this would be actively pursued, but I can’t find any info on this.
indeed. I was just thinking of those times when an adult male has to get involved in the hunt, like when he has to help in dragging down a huge cape buffalo. But for the vast majority of the hunts, you are right.
Are you saying they prey on each other to eat, or just to kill to reduce the competition they have? Hyenas don’t really hunt much, do they? They are more inclined to try and steal a kill from a cheetah, leopard, or lion. But I don’t recall seeing any footage of them chasing down a thompsons gazelle to eat on their own.
Hyenas are certainly tough and I’m sure that does discourage some lion attacks, but lions do on occasion take down full grown hyenas. Here’s a video of one:
Two lions get involved, the first lion decides he’s had enough after the hyena bites him in the mouth. The second lion doesn’t give up though.
The problem is that we have absolutely zero evidence for how much of an advantage it is and how much of a disadvantage. For all we know the mane may actually keep the lion cooler. As such speculating on relative differences is utterly pointless. All we can do is look at effects and correlations to things that we do have data for.
To repeat: Hyaena packs will kill lone lionesses if they possibly can, and lions kill every hyeana they can safely get their claws on. Of course that’s not unique to lions and hyaenas. Lions are incredibly territorial and will kill any predator that they encounter: leopards, bears, foxes, hyaenas, jackals and so forth. The pack nature of hyaenas make them one of the few animals that can actually fight back against lions.
Exactly the same is true for a lion attacking a gazelle.
There is never zero risk when two animals fight. The only question is whether the benefit outweighs the risk. In the case of lions, the benefits of driving other predators outr of their territory obviously outweighs the risk, which is why lions kill all solitary predators that they encounter. Packs of lions will also routinely kill packs of hyaenas so long as numbers are on their side.
Cub killing is also routine, which is why hyaenas nest underground. This is also the primary reason why lionesses form prides and exclude other predators. By cretaing an area with few adult predators, the cubs are much safer. While lions will hunt co-opertaively if they must, it isn’t their preferred tatcic. They prefer to hunt solitary if they can. The pride structure is mostly there to deter predation on cubs.
Adult lions do not spring out of the ground fully formed. The vast majority of adult lions catch all their own food because the vast majority of adult lions are not part of a pride. The idea that adult lions are anything other than spectacular hunters has no basis in reality.
Both.
Hyaenas are much better hunters than lions. They hunt more often, kill more animals, and have a much higher success rate per hunt. Lions are much more likely to steal a kill from hyaenas than hyaenas are to steal a kill form lions. Lions also scavenge carrion much more frequently than hyaenas.
The whole “lion as a hunter and hyaena as scavengers/theif” thing is a myth.
Thanks for posting the video. I found it interesting that they didn’t eat the carcass. Instead, they left it there in what looks like a warning to the other hyenas.
Blake, just curious, but what is your background? Is this your field?
Something to consider, by the way: In any species where females bear young, the division of labor will end up with the males taking the riskiest jobs. In humans, for instance, hunting is a fairly risky endeavor, so human hunters are traditionally male. Among lions, though, hunting is relatively low-risk (not completely risk-free, of course, but then, nothing is), and so lionesses hunt. The high-risk job among lions is fighting off hyenas, and so that ends up being the male’s job.
