Cry of the Kalahari

by Mark James Owens

  One sunset, before any of the hyena cubs appeared from the den, the truck suddenly shook. Startled, I looked around to see what it could be. Just when I was beginning to think I must have imagined it, the truck moved again. I opened the door to see if a grass owl had landed on the roof. Nothing there. Again the truck shuddered, and now I was really getting spooked. Then I looked through the back window, and there I saw Moffet’s big furry head slowly appearing over the tailgate. He stuck his nose into the bed of the pickup, sniffing at the toolbox and spare tire. He lowered his head again, taking the trailer hitch in his jaws, he rattled the truck as if it were a toy.

  “Hey, Moff, stop that!” I called out the window. He gave one last tug and then walked over to within two feet of the open window. Raising his head, he looked deep into my eyes. I said, very softly, “Look, I was just kidding. If you want to shake the truck, go right ahead.”

  Moffet yawned enormously, shook himself, and walked over to the hyena den, where he jetted scent onto a small tree. He disappeared into the brush, and the J-shaped scar on his flank was the last I saw of him.

  Those nights alone on that duneslope, with the stars hanging close overhead, were some of the most special of my life. And slowly I began to know the hyena cubs. Pippin, the oldest, was over three years and really a young adult. He foraged on his own, but still visited the den to play with the younger cubs. Chip was the next oldest, and he, too, foraged away from the den area. Sooty and Dusty, a younger brother and sister, remained at the den site all the time, along with Puff, a very young female. Finally, there were Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee, the newly arrived infants.

  The night after we discovered the communal den, I saw Patches come along one of the paths worn through the grass, carrying a fresh springbok leg in her jaws. All the cubs jumped up at the sound of her approach, their hair standing on end. The younger ones dove into the den opening; for all they knew, the sound was that of a lion or some other predator. When Patches was close enough to be recognized, the older cubs bounded toward her and circled round her in greeting for several minutes. She laid the bone on the sand and sniffed each cub that paraded under her nose, licking their ears and backs. After Sooty had paid his respects to his elder, he grabbed the springbok leg and rushed into the den, and all the others followed. Patches slept on the mound while the cubs fed inside.

  Later the same night, Shadow strolled out of the bush and the cubs circled around her, kicking up fine dust until a white cloud hung over the area. She flopped onto one of the mounds, and Puff began to suckle, her paws kneading the soft udders. I had just concluded that Shadow was Puff’s mother, when Dusty also began suckling. Because of the differences in their ages, Puff and Dusty could not both be Shadow’s cubs; she was nursing at least one that was not her own. Later we saw Patches and Star nurse each other’s young. Communal suckling had only been seen in a few other wild carnivores, including lions and wild dogs; it had never been recorded in hyenas before. It was further proof of the cooperative social system of the browns.

  Since the lactating females in the clan nursed all the cubs, and since all the females brought food to the den, at first it was not obvious who was the mother of whom. Fortunately, we had detailed records of the previous pregnancy and lactation periods of the females in the clan. By comparing this information with the ages of the cubs, and by sitting long hours at the den, we were able to confirm family relationships. We knew that Pippin was Star’s cub from a previous litter, making him the half brother (Pippin’s father had been displaced by another dominant male) of her present cubs, Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee. Chip was Patches’s cub, and Puff belonged to Shadow; we did not know who was Dusty and Sooty’s mother.

  With Star, Patches, and Shadow bringing food, and Pippin visiting the den to clear loose sand out of the tunnels and play with the cubs, one might expect the communal den to be crowded with hyenas, but this was never the case. Adult females did not visit every night and they rarely appeared at the same time. If they did happen to meet at the den, they barely acknowledged one another. We never saw the clan’s immigrant adult male, the cubs’ father, visit them or bring them any food.

  Because they had to spend so many hours foraging, most of the time there were no adults at the communal den to protect the young. Clan members slept under bushes or trees widely scattered throughout the territory, some up to five miles from the den. An adult might occasionally sleep near it during the day, but never closer than 200 to 300 yards.

  The infants were protected by the den itself and by the presence of older, larger cubs. Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee would wander up to twenty-five yards away in the tall grass, but at the sight or sound of any approaching animal, whether it be a porcupine or a lion, they would dive into one of the runs and dash underground. Minutes later, their ears, then their eyes, and finally their noses, would slowly appear like periscopes over the rim of the hole to find out if the danger had passed. If they saw that the older cubs had not taken cover, Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee would bound out of the den to resume play.

  Late one afternoon, a pack of eight wild dogs loped toward the den. The smaller cubs disappeared, but Chip, Dusty, and Sooty, who were three-quarters adult size, stayed on the outside and faced the predators. Standing on the largest mound, with every hair bristling, they looked quite formidable. The dogs circled the den area three times, occasionally trotting closer for a better view, but eventually moved away. However, when Moffet came by the den one afternoon, all the cubs, including Chip, Dusty, and Sooty, disappeared inside and did not come out again for more than an hour after the lion had left.

  The cubs occasionally wandered too far from the protection of the den. When Puff was about the size of a small, stocky bulldog, one night she strayed farther away from the den than usual. Loud screams and sounds of a struggle came from the tall grass. By the time we arrived, a leopard was dragging her tom body toward an acacia tree. Even after Puff’s death, Shadow, her mother, continued to suckle and provision the other cubs.

  Every day at sunset, after the heat had broken for the day, the cubs would peer out of the four den openings. When they were satisfied that there was no danger, they would plod out of the runs and collapse on the mounds of excavated sand. Later, when cool air began to flow down the duneslopes into the valley, the cubs began smelling grass-stalks, twigs, old bones, and anything else they could get their noses into. These are important lessons for hyenas, who spend much of their time foraging in tall grass, where they cannot see more than a few feet ahead, and who must locate widely scattered pieces of carrion. As adults, they would also depend heavily on their sense of smell to warn them of dangers from lions and to maintain contact with one another by scent-marking.

  Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee tried to scent-mark long before their anal glands began to produce the viscous paste excreted by adults. Over and over again they raised their small fuzzy tails, turned, and squatted over a stalk, trying to leave their olfactory calling cards and always sniffing to see whether they had succeeded.

  At about four months of age, soon after they were moved to the communal den, they discovered that they were able to make their own paste. They looked very proud of themselves, strutting around the denning area, raising their tails, and daubing white, gooey drops on everything—even on the tail of an unsuspecting adult and the legs of our camera tripod.

  Games in which one cub tested itself against another were an important part of their development. From the first day they emerged from the maternal den, the infant cubs exhibited the same behavioral patterns in play-fighting as those used by adults in combat: muzzle-wrestling, neck-biting, nipping the hind legs, and chasing. Play was important in developing social ties among the young, and it probably sharpened the fighting skills that would later be necessary in the battle for status in the clan’s social hierarchy.

  Whenever Pippin arrived at the den, the cubs greeted him with great excitement, springing forward to circle him, pulling at his tail, and jumping up to nip at his ears. In typical big brother f
ashion, he led them on a merry chase in and out of the bushes, but he always let them catch him, as he tossed his head from side to side to avoid their snapping jaws.

  If young cubs were not reared in communal dens, they wouldn’t benefit from the protection and play experience provided by older cubs, and they wouldn’t be as likely to learn from, and form social bonds with, all of the adult members of their clan.

  By February 1979 we had been searching the dull skies for months for any sign of rain. February is usually the height of the rainy season, but there was seldom a cloud in the sky, and midday temperatures were breaking no degrees in the shade. Occasionally the massive head of a cumulus formation peeked over the eastern horizon, only to sink from sight, spilling its life-giving moisture on other lands. By the beginning of April, the clouds were gone and we had lost all hope. The rains of 1979 had failed completely. Except for one brief shower, it had been twelve months since the animals and plants in Deception Valley had tasted moisture, and there was no chance of relief for ten months to come. The Kalahari was locked in drought.

  When the lions—now spread over immense areas beyond the dry river system—occasionally visited the valley, their kills were so small that nothing but blood-stained feathers, quills, or a horn or hoof were left for the brown hyenas. The cheetahs and wild dogs had disappeared when the last of the springbok had left the valley. Now ants, termites, birds, rodents, and an occasional steenbok were the only prey available for leopards and jackals, and most of these small prey were completely consumed. Star, Patches, McDuff, and Pippin walked over the grey desert twenty miles or more every night in search of food. They, too, lapped up termites and chased mice, hedgehogs, porcupines, and springhare. The food supply could only get worse during the coming dry season, and since there had been no rain, there were no wild melons to be eaten for moisture.

  At eighteen months of age, Dusty and Sooty had begun to forage on their own. As Pogo and Hawkins had done years earlier, they tagged behind Star, Patches, or Shadow when one of them left the den. Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee were often the only cubs left in their earthen home, which had become a quiet and lonely place. Sometimes several nights would pass while they waited patiently for something to eat. Star was the only female still lactating, and at six and a half months, the three cubs were still heavily dependent on her milk for nourishment and moisture.

  One windy night, Star walked north along Leopard Trail to Bergie Pan, crossed the riverbed, and moved northeast to the slopes of East Dune. By midnight she had traveled more than twelve miles and had not found anything to eat, for herself or to take back to her young. She poked her nose into the entrances to several rat and springhare colonies, but no one was home. She was tired and lay down to rest near a grove of broad-leafed lonchocarpus trees about a mile from the riverbed.

  Muffin and Moffet had spent days roaming the sandveld areas east of Deception Valley, crossing the game reserve boundary into cattle country several times. This night, they moved back west into their former wet-season territory and started trudging up the face of East Dune. Having seen only one hartebeest, which had cantered away from them, they were lean and hungry.

  Lying flat on her side, her scarred head and neck on the cooling sand, Star occasionally pawed some of the fine grains onto her wrinkled belly. Sometime later she heard a faint sound from downwind. Perhaps the wind had covered the lions’ approach, or maybe she had slept too soundly. But when she jumped up it was too late. Muffin and Moffet rushed in, mauling her, and in seconds Star was dead.

  21

  Pepper

  Delia

  A little more than kin and less than kind.

  —William Shakespeare

  PEPPER, COCOA, AND TOFFEE had no way of knowing that their mother was dead. Hour after hour, night after night, they lay on the den mounds, their chins on their paws, watching the path on which Star usually approached. As the time passed, their lethargy deepened; they did not play. Every few hours they plodded slowly around the area, smelling once more the few splinters of dessicated bones. They spent the long hot days in the den’s cool interior, conserving the moisture in their withering bodies.

  Their bony shoulders stuck out at sharp angles, and their hair began to fall out. The days were incredibly hot and dry, as though there had never been water on the earth, but the nights, at least, were mercifully cool.

  On the fourth night after her death, Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee did not come out of the den. For three nights we sat watching the bare mounds in the moonlight, hoping for some sign of life. We had to find out, so we crept to one of the main entrances, knelt, and listened. No sound from inside, and no small hyena tracks in the sand. The cubs must have starved to death or died of thirst.

  But when we stood up and turned to go back to the truck, a thud and a squeak drifted out of the hole. At least one was still alive—but for how long?

  Around midnight, a loud rustling came from the grass west of the den, and Pippin, the cubs’ half brother, stepped into the clearing, a freshly killed springhare dangling from his jaws. He laid the four-pound mammal in the sand, walked to the entrance, and purred loudly. Immediately all three of the weak and hungry cubs scrambled out to greet him with eager squeals. They circled Pip again and again and then ran to the springhare and dragged it toward the den. On their way they stopped to rush around him one more time, raising great clouds of dust in their excitement. Then, tearing and pulling at the food, they disappeared inside.

  Pippin stood on the mound alone, his legs long and lanky and his body thin. Without moving his head, he rolled his eyes and gave us a long look, just as his mother, Star, had so often done. Then he shook his long hair, flicked his tail, and walked away into the bush.

  “Mark! Maybe he’ll adopt them,” I whispered. Not only did Star’s cubs now have a chance to survive, but this was a high point in our brown hyena study. Adoption in nature is extremely rare; group members in most species usually abandon orphans and devote their efforts to rearing a litter of their own.

  Early the next evening, Dusty came to the den carrying a large piece of giraffe skin, which had quite a bit of fresh meat attached to it. Following a few steps behind was Chip, the older male cub. Squealing and grinning, their tails raised in greeting, Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee rushed forward and crawled around their old den mates. Cocoa grabbed the skin and they vanished inside. If we had observed this scene without knowing the identity of the individual hyenas, we could easily have thought that this was a mother and father feeding their young. In fact, they were all cousins.

  Over the following days, certain clan members began to care for Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee. We now realized why we had been unable to establish who was the mother of Dusty and Sooty: She had died, and, like Star’s cubs, they had been adopted by the clan.

  Now that they were being fed by Patches, Shadow, Dusty, and Pippin, the cubs grew stronger. Though brown hyena young often suckle until they are ten to twelve months old, these three had been abruptly weaned from their mother’s milk at the age of seven months. Despite this radical change in their diets, they seemed to thrive on the meat, skin, and bones brought to them, and their chances for survival looked better and better.

  We observed the communal den for more than three years and made several interesting discoveries. For one thing, adoption occurs often in brown hyenas. In the period during which we watched the den, seventy percent of the cubs that survived were adopted orphans.

  Most brown hyena females stay in the clan to which they are born; thus they are all related. Because we had been observing the clan for so long, we knew many of the relationships. Patches and Shadow were Star’s cousins, making them Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee’s first cousins once removed; Dusty was an older second cousin; and, Pippin, we knew, was their half brother. The cubs had been adopted by their relatives.

  Thus hyenas, long considered vermin and listed in a thesaurus as synonymous with “cur” and “viper,” help other hyenas by feeding and adopting their cubs; not only are they very
social creatures, they seem to be very selfless, as well.

  But how selfless are they, really? In the midst of a drought, why did Patches, Shadow, Dusty, and Pippin provide Star’s cubs with food that they could have eaten themselves? Why would they aid another’s young at a cost to themselves?

  Part of the answer can probably be found in the sociobiological theory of kin selection.1 “Fitness” in the term survival of the fittest does not refer to how physically strong an individual is but rather to its survival and the number of genes that individual passes to future generations. Any animal, including humans, can increase its genetic fitness in two ways: directly, by producing offspring who carry one half of its genes; and indirectly, by enhancing the survival of its more distant relatives—cousins, nephews, nieces—who carry a smaller proportion of its genes.2

  Since Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee were Shadow’s first cousins once removed, each cub carried some of the same genes she had. By keeping the three of them alive, Shadow would increase her genetic fitness. Shadow’s only cub, Puff, had been killed. If Pepper, Cocoa, and Toffee had also died, Shadow would have lost one of her few chances to pass her genes to future generations. This is especially important since a brown hyena female does not have many opportunities in her lifetime to raise litters. Each of the cubs also carried one-quarter of the same genes as Pippin, their half brother; thus feeding them benefited him genetically.

  So, according to the theory of kin selection, the clan members who were feeding the cubs were not being altruistic. In fact, the food they brought to the den to keep their cousins or half siblings alive was merely an investment in perpetuating their own lineage. Of course, the brown hyenas themselves did not realize why they were feeding the orphans. During the evolution of their social behavior, those who possessed the “helping” genes and participated in provisioning must have kept more of their relatives alive, than did those hyenas without the genes who did not provision; so the behavior evolved as part of the natural life style of brown hyena sociality.