Brown Hyena Survival Trust

The Animal   

The Brown Hyena belongs to the family of hyaenidae, which consist of the Brown Spotted and Striped Hyenas as well as the Aardwolf.

   Spotted Hyena                    Striped Hyena                    Aardwolf      

The Clan (Breeding Family)  

The family structure is more complex than most other mammals to the extent that human interference are currently causing the population to plummet and in some areas no new babies are being born.

The clan consist of multiple animals of both sexes that would share a den site. The clan has a alpha female that would be the only breeding animal within the clan. There is no alpha male within the clan as roaming males fills this position.

As the senses of the animal is very acute the roaming male would pick up the ovulating female at quite a distance, as well as from scent marking done by the female in the form of pasting.

The roaming male finding the female would copulate and stay for an un determined period, should the male stay within the family until the birth of the offspring and up to the point that the female ovulates again the male would ignore the female as he has become part of the clan and thus ends the breeding cycle between them.

Although the animals stay in a clan they would forage on their own, as far as 40Km from the den site. There has been reports and photographs of animals foraging and feeding together, the reason for the multiple foraging would be juvenile animals as for the sharing of food the animals do not show aggression when more than one animal find the same carcass.

The animal senses are very good and they can smell a carcass at distances in excess of 5Km.

A greeting known as necking takes place when two animals meet. the two would bite each other in the neck as a sign of greeting.

Breeding Cycle

This would mean that in ideal situations there would be a litter every 24 months. This ideal situation would mean that a roaming male is within the vicinity of the ovulating female that would ovulate for up to 2 weeks.

Pasting

Pasting is done with an anal pouch the animal lift the tale and walks backwards into grass or small shrubs to apply a two layered secretion. The secretion consist a white paste and black watery top strip, the white secretion would go brown as it gets older. We can smell the secretion whilst it is still fresh for about a month, but the Brown Hyena would smell it for quite a some time still.

Pasting would be placed at intervals of 3 to 4 per Km. This would tell the other animals what the sex etc. is of the animals that left the pasting.

Sexual Maturity

Sexual maturity has been recorded at as young as 2,5 years but the norm is 5 years.  

Diet

The Brown Hyena's feeding consist of less than 2,5 % life kill around 40% fruit and veg. and the balance would then be carrion.

Dung

Sound

"Brown Hyena are very vocal animals, like the Spotted Hyena, but unlike Spotted Hyena, Brown hyena do not have the distinctive laughing call.  Brown Hyenas calls are often heard at dusk.  When squabbling with each other over food, Brown Hyena will growl, snarl, yowl and whine at each other.  The sound console below includes a sound sample of a Brown Hyena.  The sound playing console may take a short time to load, particularly if you have a slow internet connection.  You will need the macromedia flash plug in to listen to the sound file." (Complements of the team at www.predatorconservation.com )

Distribution

The Brown Hyena is a Southern African animal, found in South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique Angola. 

South Africa

The population in South Africa is unknown as it is very difficult to do an actual count. They are found throughout the country in the more arid areas. Nature Conservation South Africa has an estimated quantity of 5000 to 8000 animals. The accuracy of this estimate is suspicious to say the least as the method of getting to this total could be incorrect.

Zimbabwe, Mozambique Angola

It must be said that there was not a sighting of Brown Hyena in Zimbabwe, Mozambique and Angola in the last few years this does not mean that there are no animals left as they are very shy creatures. However the wars that raged in the areas could have completely destroyed the population.

Botswana

The Botswana problem would be in the delta getting wetter every year extending the range of Spotted Hyena, Lion and Leopard, which are the natural enemy of the Brown Hyena. This situation needs to be studied as to look at the impact on the breeding and feeding of the Brown Hyena.

Namibia

The actual count done in Namibia came to between 800 and a 1200 animals. This figure should be a red light in the conservation of the animal as this arid area would be the ideal area for them.

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