Hyenas are lazy animals.
They scavenge for most of their food, lie in the shade for most of the day, and tend to hang out around water or carcasses so as to minimize the distance they need to travel for refreshment.
The Hyena’s lack of vitality is particularly frustrating for the wildlife photographer. A brown shape slumped next to water, or next to another brown lump, does not necessarily communicate “carnivore” very well.
That’s one of the reasons I’m excited to share the above photo with you.
The photo explores a series of interesting tensions and actions. Perhaps the most obvious is that between carnivore-herbivore. Notice the determined posture of the Hyena as he or she trots closer to the Wildebeest herd. One of the ungulates raises it’s head acknowledging the carnivore’s presence, and the rest seem not to notice, or care.
I took took the shot at Ngorongoro conservation area in Tanzania, where we had seen many lazy Hyenas and I had taken many photos of brown sacks. We were on our way out of the park, far from where we had seen the other lethargic beasts dozing by a small water hole, when this individual came trotting over a small hill.
Hyena’s are not known for being hunters, and on the occasion they choose to eat fresh meat, they’ll hunt in packs and target the weakest animal. As we sat in the Land Rover, we suspected we were not about to witness a kill, let alone a chase of any kind. And we were right, but as the Hyena approached the Wildebeest herd, we had at least set our hopes on some sort of show. Perhaps the most astonishing thing about the encounter was the lack of reaction from either party.
Now, one of the Wildebeest could have run a simple, reductionist model based on the herd’s limited knowledge of Hyena behavior and reached the essentialist conclusion that the hungry, carnivorous Hyena would eat the entire herd and the whole species was doomed to extinction as a simple extrapolated result of there being Hyenas wherever there are Wildebeest. Maybe this Wildebeest would be criticized as coming off as a bit too apocalyptic, but he would stand by his model, update it a little, and still reach the same conclusion: we’re all doomed. Other Wildebeest would follow his lead and run around trying to preserve what little there was left of Wildebeest life, and do their best to make the other herd members aware of their impending tragedy.
Another Wildebeest might counter that the root of all their real problems is actually their faith and that the herd should re-think their connection to the savannah and the Hyena. After all, Hyena or Wildebeest, we’re all part of the same creation. In fact, where does Hyena stop and Wildebeest begin? Isn’t there a balance here? The Hyena has intrinsic value too. Isn’t the Hyena just us protecting ourselves from us? Maybe we should let the Hyena eat it’s fill…
An additional Wildebeest would come in and tentatively agree with the last and say that there is actually no such thing as “Hyena” because “Hyenas” don’t exist anymore. Hyenas are fundamentally not Hyenas because they’ve been irreversibly influenced by Wildebeest. Anyways, what is a Hyena, really? Plus, how do we even know Hyenas are bad?
At the moment the whole herd is asking the few wise Wildebeest, “so, what’s the right thing to do now? Should we care? And how should we react?”
All this time the Hyena had been making it’s way through the mess of grazing and ruminating ungulates without the slightest adjustment to pace nor heading, back towards the watering hole where we had first seen it’s kind.
The Hyena had a plan. A theory so to speak. A set of ideas and concepts with which it could navigate the world. The Hyena made it through the herd of Wildebeest without fear of being mauled to death by a group of much larger animals acting to protect their own kind. This type of bravery must be founded on a set of beliefs, informed by theory or based on empirical knowledge. The Hyena’s theories held water, and it survived, but even with all the theory on Wildebeest behavior in the world the Hyena never would have made it through the herd in the first place without action.
Which is, in itself, strange behavior for Hyenas.