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This gives them an extremely ferocious bite, the strongest of any mammal. Hyenas have large and strong jaw muscles and a vaulting that protects their skull against force. These animals have great hearing, that helps them locate and track down potential prey, and sharp eyesight that allows them to see well even at night. They have a high endurance due to their large heart, that accounts for around 1% of their total body weight. Hyenas can run as fast as 64km per hour and maintain their speed over long distances. What adaptations do hyenas have that help them capture prey? Once they are on the ground, the pack will close in on the animal to kill and eat it. They capture their prey by biting them and dragging them down to the ground. For this reason, their hunting strategy involves isolating herd members or targeting young or weakened members of a herd.
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While they are adept hunters, they aren’t as large as other African predators, and they can be in danger if their prey are in large groups that defend one another. Large animals, like grazing herbivores, are hunted by a group of hyenas, whilst smaller mammals, birds and reptiles are hunted by individual hyenas. The clan is led by a dominant female hyena. They live in large clans made up anywhere between 50 to 100 hyenas, with usually some 80 per clan. They can eat as many as 30,000 termites in a night. It captures the termites with its sticky tongue by licking them. It feeds entirely on insects and is referred to as the termite-eating hyena.
Are hyenas scavengers full#
Hyenas eat eggs, ostrich nests are full of appealing snacks, and bones.Ĭuriously, the aardwolf, which is in the same family as the hyena, is an insectivorous mammal. They also hunt and eat smaller prey, like birds, lizards, snakes, and insects. They predate on large mammals like antelopes, wildebeest, zebras, jackals and even hippopotamuses that they chase and kill. They’re often spotted among other scavengers like vultures, competing and squabbling over the left-over food. They are notorious scavengers, picking at carcases and rotting meat left behind by other predators. They have the digestive system and denture that is characteristic of carnivores, like large canine teeth. Their diet consists almost entirely of feed from an animal origin.