Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2020 Apr 3;10(15):7953-7962.
doi: 10.1002/ece3.6223. eCollection 2020 Aug.

The diet of the striped hyena in Nepal's lowland regions

Shivish Bhandari  1 , Craig Morley  2 , Achyut Aryal  2   3   4   5 , Uttam Babu Shrestha  3   6
Affiliations

The diet of the striped hyena in Nepal's lowland regions

Shivish Bhandari et al. Ecol Evol. .

Abstract

Striped hyenas (Hyaena hyaena) are extremely rare in Nepal, and only a few people have studied them in their natural forest and grassland habitat. Their rarity is due to anthropogenic pressures such as hunting, habitat modification, being killed on roads, and depletion of their natural prey. Here, we studied the feeding ecology of hyenas in lowland, Nepal. We employed an opportunistic sampling to collect hyena scats in a range of habitats and the line transect sampling to identify the prey of the hyena in the study site. We collected 68 hyena scats between 2015 and 2018. Most of the hyena scat (39.7%) was found in the Churia Hill forest followed by riverbed (26.4%), mixed forest (14.7%), Sal (Shorea robusta)-dominated forest (11.7%), and grassland area (7.3%). We found eleven mammalian prey species, plants, and some unidentified items in the hyena scats. The frequency of occurrence and relative biomass of the medium-sized wild boar (Sus scrofa) were higher than other smaller prey species such as hare (Lepus nigricollis) and rhesus macaque (Macaca mulatta). Similarly, the proportion of large prey species such as nilgai (Boselaphus tragocamelus) in the hyena diet was lower compared with wild boar, hares, and rhesus macaques indicating medium-sized wild boar is the most preferred prey species. Livestock contributed 17.3% of the total dietary biomass. Domesticated species such as goats, sheep, cows, and even dogs were found in the diet of hyenas. Predation of livestock by hyenas could cause conflict, especially if this ongoing issue continues in the future. Rather, more conservation effort is required in lowland areas of Nepal to protect the hyenas' natural prey species, particularly in wildlife habitats to reduce the lure of taking domestic livestock. Similarly, conservation education at the local level and active involvement of government authorities in the conservation of this species might be helpful to mitigate human-hyena conflict in the human-dominated landscape.

Keywords: Hyaena hyaena; Nepal; diet; predators; wildlife.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

None declared.

Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
The study site locations, the Mahottari and Sarlahi District in lowland Nepal. The inset map shows the land use maps of two studied districts and sample locations
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Percentages of frequency occurrence and relative biomass of prey species found in the hyena scats
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Frequency of prey species found in different habitat types in the study site
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. AbiSaid, M. , & Dloniak, S.M.D. 2015. Hyaena hyaena. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2015: e.T10274A45195080. 10.2305/IUCN.UK.2015-2.RLTS.T10274A45195080.en - DOI
    1. Adhikari, D. , Gurung, A. , Sigdel, P. , Poudel, S. , Regmi, P. R. , & Basnet, S. (2018). Striped hyaena: The recent record of road kill of Hyaena hyaena in Central Terai of Nepal. Zoo's Print, 33(10), 23–26.
    1. Alam, M. S. , & Khan, J. A. (2015). Food habits of striped hyena (Hyaena hyaena) in a semi‐arid conservation area of India. Journal of Arid Land, 7(6), 860–866.
    1. Alam, M. S. , Khan, J. A. , & Pathak, B. J. (2015). Striped hyena (Hyaena hyaena) status and factors affecting its distribution in the Gir National Park and Sanctuary, India. Folia Zoologica, 64, 32–39.
    1. Anderson, D. R. , Laake, J. L. , Crain, B. R. , & Burnham, K. P. (1979). Guidelines for line transect sampling of biological populations. Journal of Wildlife Management, 43(1), 70–78.

LinkOut - more resources