Hyena Nights and Kalahari Days by Gus Mills

Author:Gus Mills [Mills, Gus]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Publisher: Jacana Media
Published: 2010-04-01T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 9

Spotted Hyenas versus the Cats

EACH SUNSET that Hermanus and I set out to look for hyenas there was an air of expectation – we could never predict what would happen before the sun rose again. Often, of course, very little would happen and we would spend several boring hours watching hyenas sleep and listening to the BBC. Other nights were packed full of excitement and interest that kept us going until after sunrise.

One such night occurred in May 1980, although it started quietly enough. We came to the Kousaunt den to find Old Flat Ear lying there alone. She did not appear to be interested in anything but sleep that night. Not knowing where any other members of the clan were, we had no alternative but to take our chances with the old female. At 9 pm she stirred, but after a good stretch she only moved off a few hundred metres, then flopped down again. Although five minutes later she was up, she really did not appear to have much enthusiasm and was soon down again. In fits and starts she gradually moved into and then across the Nossob river-bed and into the dunes on the Botswana side. By 11.30 pm she had moved only eight kilometres when her behaviour changed drastically.

Suddenly she began loping with her nose in the air, obviously having smelt something interesting. After two kilometres she stopped and looked off intently into the night. A careful scan with the spotlight revealed a lioness some 100 metres away, lying next to an only slightly eaten gemsbok carcass.

Old Flat Ear stood staring at the lioness for several minutes. She moved closer and stopped again, her eyes fixed on the lioness and her kill. Then she started to whoop – the characteristic call of the spotted hyena. Old Flat Ear had a characteristically deep guttural whoop, which she usually repeated six or seven times in a bout. This night she whooped 17 times consecutively. Almost immediately a hyena replied and within two minutes Olivia, Hans and Old Flat Ear’s one-year-old son Six Darts (so called because that’s how many it had taken to immobilise him for marking – I missed five times!) came running up to her. Did she know they were in the vicinity or was it her good fortune? I think the former.

After noisily greeting each other, the hyenas approached the lioness, with the three adults advancing shoulder to shoulder and the younger one bringing up the rear. Until the reinforcements arrived the lioness had paid very little attention to Old Flat Ear. Now she dragged the carcass deeper under the tree and started feeding. It was as if she knew that her time at the banquet table was nearly up. The hyenas, emitting the most intimidating series of lows, hoot-laughs and whoops, kept on approaching, their ears cocked, their black tails bristling and curled over their backs. The lioness sat up and faced them, trying to intimidate the hyenas by growling fiercely, but her

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