A new study has discovered that male lions are very successful hunters themselves and do not have to depend on female lions for food.
It's been a popular belief that male lions depend on female lions to hunt and get them food. However, a new study has found that, by themselves, male lions are pretty good and successful hunters and need not necessarily depend on female lions for meat. The study shows that male lions use dense savanna vegetation for ambush-style hunting in Africa.
Female lions rely on cooperative strategies to hunt their prey. Previous studies have stated that male lions are capable of hunting but since they are not as cooperative as female lions, scientists were not sure about how successful male lions were at hunting and what technique they used. Scientists wondered if they used dense vegetation to hunt, but no studies were carried out since it was too dangerous to observe lions in the dense African savanna.
Carnegie's Scott Loarie and Greg Asner used different technologies for their study and were successful in deriving a conclusion. First, they created 3-D maps of the savanna vegetation using laser pulses that sweep across the African plains.
It was found that both male and female lions preferred to rest in areas of dense vegetation and similarly short viewsheds during the day. However, at night the game changed. While female lions hunted in areas with large viewsheds, male lions hunted in dense vegetation areas where their prey is more vulnerable. Researchers rarely explore these areas. Authors of the study concluded that attacking its prey from behind was probably the reason behind a male lion's hunting success.
"By strongly linking male lion hunting behavior to dense vegetation, this study suggests that changes to vegetation structure, such as through fire management, could greatly alter the balance of predators and prey," Loarie said.
However, the authors stated that their findings need to be confirmed by conducting similar studies across other African savannas. Their findings were published in Animal Behavior.
