Wildlife: Mammals -
Hyaena 1/3
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Wildlife
Crocuta Crocuta, Spotted Hyaena, Gevlekte Hiëna, Hyäne.
 Description
The hyaena we know in the Kruger National Park appears like a large, heavily
built dog. It is off-white to light brown coloured with irregular dark spots
that tend to fade with age. The muzzle is black, and the face is the same colour
as the body. The head is massive with a heavy muzzle. The ears are rounded. Its
limbs are sturdily built, the front legs longer than the hind. The hair is
relatively short and somewhat woolly. The hair does become sparse with ago
though. The short tail has a bushy black tip. It is very different to tell the
sexes apart. Females have fat-filled pseudoscrotum and the clitoris is erectile,
the same size and almost the same size as the male's penis. Both the male and
female hyaena will reach a length up to 170 centimetres. The shoulder height
reaches 88 centimetres at the most. Males can weigh up to 60 kilogramms while
females will reach weights up to 88 kilogramms.
Habitat
The Kruger National Park is one of the last places where the
spotted hyaena remains within South Africa. The preferred
habitat is wide, excluding true desert and dense forest. They
require a sustainable source of medium-sized ungulate prey.
Diet
The usual diet consists out of medium-sized ungulates such as
the blue wildebeest, gemsbok, zebra and impala. It will also
take smaller mammals as prey down to the size of rodents, birds,
fruit, eggs, insects and even garbage. Over 40 different foods
have been discovered. They hunt and scavenge. In the Kruger
National Park they kill approximately 50% of their own food.
They will eat 3 800 gramms of food every day. In the Kruger
National Park 15% of the diet exists out of blue wildebeest, 15%
out of kudu, 15% out of impala and 22% out of steenbok.
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