When people think of the African savannah, the first thing that comes to mind is probably the lion, whose strong individual combat ability and teamwork hunting tactics occupy the top of the food chain.
The second most impressive is the "Second Brother of Africa" spotted hyena, which is notorious for pulling out its anus, attacking the weakness of prey, and also becoming the top predator in the African savannah after the lions by virtue of its numerical superiority.
The relationship between lions and spotted hyenas is a competitive relationship, they are eternal enemies, from the emotional point of view, most of them prefer the mighty majesty of lions, and hate the lewd appearance of spotted hyenas, and articles or videos that compare the two with each other abound.
In fact, in addition to lions and spotted hyenas, there is a powerful predator living in the African savannah, the wild dog. Many people do not take the hunting ability of wild dogs seriously, because their size is too small, generally only 25 to 30 kilograms, similar to the weight of a dog, not even half of the weight of the spotted hyena, let alone compared with the weight of about 250 kilograms of male lions.
But in the wild dog's diet, many prey overlaps with the prey of lions and spotted hyenas, and wild dogs not only prey on small mammals, but also hunt large and medium-sized herbivores such as antelopes, wildebeests, and even bison.
This is incredible, after all, an adult bison weighs more than 1,000 pounds, which is a huge behemoth for wild dogs! So what is the secret weapon of the wild dog, which can hunt bison weighing up to a thousand pounds with a weight of 50 pounds? Let's talk about this topic.
1. Let's take a brief look at the African wild dog
African wild dogs, known scientifically as African wild dogs, are a family of their own in the canid family, that is, the African wild dog genus, and only one species remains, distributed in sub-Saharan Africa.
African wild dogs are about 100 cm long, shoulder height of 75 cm, weigh 20 to 25 kg, male and female individuals are not much different in body shape, the size is similar to a rear, which is why they are not dogs but are called wild dogs.
The fur color of the wild dog is more messy, but the body is mainly black, yellow and white, and there is a black vertical line on the brain gate, with a white tail tip, and the wild dog is also called a color wolf or a three-colored wild dog.
African wild dogs are the largest local canids, and it should be pointed out here that spotted hyenas are not canines, but hyenas, so wild dogs are the largest canines in Africa. However, wild dogs have some differences from other canines, one of which is that they have only four toes per foot and no upper paws on their forelimbs, which is unique among canines.
2, let's take a look at the way wild dogs live in groups
Carnivores living in the African savannah, in addition to their own ability to hunt, teamwork is crucial, such as lions and spotted hyenas, individual hunting ability is not weak, but they prefer to hunt in groups.
Therefore, the wild dog can become the "african third brother" second only to the spotted hyena, or rely on the survival strategy of collective cooperation. In the past, the number of members of the wild dog group was about 40, and the largest group even reached the size of hundreds.
However, due to the damage of human activities to the natural environment, the size of the current wild dog group is mostly around a dozen. The territory of a group of wild dogs ranges from 1500 to 2000 square kilometers, which is larger than the territory of lions, but the territory of different groups of wild dogs overlaps.
Most mammal groups are "matrilineal clans", i.e. the females of the group are generally fixed and the males are mobile. For example, the female in the lion group does not leave the lion group for a lifetime, the male lion will be expelled when he becomes an adult, and the lion king can only be a foreign male lion.
But African wild dogs are different, they are "patrilineal clans", and the females in the wild dog group leave the group before reaching adulthood to live in other groups to avoid inbreeding.
Adult female lions in the lion group generally enjoy the right to mate and are eligible to breed for the lion king, but there are dominant breeding pairs in the wild dog group. That is to say, only the most powerful pair of male and female wild dogs in the group are eligible to reproduce, and this pair of wild dogs will suppress other wild dogs and deprive them of breeding qualifications.
This system is actually more progressive than that of lions, and the reproductive repression of other members of the group is the path to a strict social system. This system of having only one pair of wild dogs in possession of reproductive rights can prompt other wild dogs to work for the fertility of the dominant wild dogs. Moreover, the fertility of a pair of wild dogs will not affect the reproduction of the population, because a female wild dog can give birth to 2 to 19 cubs in one litter, and the reproductive ability is very strong.
Dominant females don't have to worry about taking care of so many cubs, because other female wild dogs in the wild dog herd can produce milk even if they don't have cubs, and act as nurses for the cubs in the group, which is rare in other mammals.
3. The african wild dog has a strong hunting ability
The hunting method of social animals is often hunted, and in the case of limited individual combat effectiveness, collective dispatch can greatly improve the success rate of hunting.
In the African savannah, lions and spotted hyenas rely on collective cooperation to hunt, but the success rate is often difficult to exceed 30%, and the success rate of wild dog hunting is as high as 80%, and they must have their own superiority:
1. Wild dogs have the innate endurance of canines
Canines are known for their endurance, such as wolves, who rely on endurance to chase their prey until they are exhausted. Wild dogs also have amazing endurance, and they can chase prey for up to 60 minutes at a speed of 66 kilometers per hour, which is more powerful than the endurance of wolves.
2. Wild dogs take turns to consume prey
Lions rely on ambushes, only to chase the prey for a distance of 100 to 200 meters and then give up, spotted hyenas have strong endurance, can always consume the physical strength of the prey. In addition to consuming prey, the wild dogs also know the strategy of taking turns, some of them chase the prey and put pressure on the prey, while the other part maintains physical strength and follows at a uniform speed, and when the first echelon is tired, the rested wild dogs rush forward to continue chasing.
3, wild dogs also know how to hunt tactics
When rounding up prey, wild dogs do not simply chase, they will use some tactics, such as the wild dogs will send a small team to quietly detour from the side, ambushing in front of the prey escape route, ready to launch a surprise attack.
When a wild dog chases prey, all members will form a fan shape, which can effectively prevent those prey that take the "zigzag" escape route, such as antelope running away, no matter how to jump out of the wild dog's chase range.
Studies have shown that wild dogs can make 16 different sounds during hunting, communicate with each other in groups, arrange strategies, and they can even make some low-frequency sounds that humans can't hear.
When a wild dog catches prey, it will generally divide the prey as quickly as possible to prevent other predators from coming to grab it, and lions and spotted hyenas are the biggest competitors of wild dogs, waiting to rob wild dogs of the fruits of victory at any time.
A wild dog can eat about 3 to 4 kilograms of food at a time, but this does not belong to themselves, but to the group. After swallowing their prey, wild dogs do not completely take possession of themselves, and they can spit out the meat of their stomachs and distribute it to other members, a behavior that is rare in other mammalian males.
This mutual assistance behavior of wild dogs is not only reflected in eating, they also know how to take care of the injured kind, lick the wounds of the wounded, and the wild dog group is the closest species to the true social animal.
4. What does the wild dog herd rely on to hunt bison?
Bison are one of the most popular prey in the African savannah, lions like to hunt bison, spotted hyenas also like, and a bison can provide much more meat than other prey.
Of course, whether it is a lion or a spotted hyena, hunting bison is not an easy task, an adult African bison weighs 700 kilograms, which is a huge behemoth for female lions, but several female lions and one or two male lions together round up, or can take down the single bison.
The tactics of the spotted hyena against the bison are to consume and pull the anus, the spotted hyena group has been chasing the bison until exhausted, and then play the extraction stunt, sneaking from the rear of the bison, once the bison is bitten by the spotted hyena, it is difficult to escape.
It is unimaginable that a wild dog weighing only about 50 pounds can even hunt bison, to know that the bison is more than 20 times the weight of the wild dog, how does the wild dog hunt the bison?
The predation strategy of wild dogs has been introduced in the previous section, and will not be repeated here, wild dogs rely on the tactics of collective combat, constantly depleting the physical strength of wild dogs. When the bison are exhausted and unable to move, the wild dogs rush up and bite the bison's body, which is actually the hunting method of most social predators.
In fact, in addition to the strong hunting ability of wild dogs, it is also related to the life habits of bison. In order to improve the survival ability of bison and reduce the chance of being hunted by carnivores, bison also adopt a social strategy, and with the huge body of bison and hard horns, few carnivores dare to directly attack the bison herd.
But bison will have old and sick, whether it is lions, or spotted hyenas, or wild dogs, they chase and kill the bison is often left alone, weak and sick, they are left behind by the bison herd in the negotiation process, which gives predators the opportunity.
Once predators have captured the single bison, the herd will no longer run away, they will not come to the rescue, and they will even watch their companions being eaten from a distance. This seemingly abandonment of companionship is actually conducive to the elimination of weak members of the bison herd, which is conducive to the evolution of the entire population of bison.
5. Conclusion
Most of the friends who like to see the animal world pay more attention to the lions and spotted hyenas of the African savannah, while the presence of wild dogs is relatively low.
But wild dogs, with their collective intelligence, can also have a place in the African savannah, and although they can't compete with predators such as lions and spotted hyenas, they are also able to hunt larger herbivores.
If you look at the proportion of body size, 50 pounds of spotted hyenas can hunt thousands of pounds of bison, which is more powerful than lions in a sense, to know that the weight of bison is more than 50 times that of lions, lions can not hunt prey that is 50 times more important than their own body!
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