Do The Footprints Belong To A Hyena Or Could They Be The Prints Of A Leopard?

Footprints in the sand

Fresh pad prints surround your house every morning. Tracks lie criss-cross along every trail you walk, be it a footpath or a gravel road. Early hikers draw circles around interesting and/or suspicious prints.

People can differ strongly about the origin of prints. Even “experts” can be fooled. Second opinions are often useful. Does this heart-shaped pad with four clear toes belong to a hyena or a leopard? Could this, almost identical but much smaller, print be that of a genet or a cub of a larger species? And this one with the nail marks? Is it a baby hyena? Could it be a banded mongoose, or is it perhaps a dwarf mongoose?

The “experts” have my sympathy. Take the hyena for example. It is by far the ugliest predator. It cannot be mistaken for anything else. But its footprints are confusing. Do the prints indeed belong to a hyena or could they be the prints of a leopard? “Elementary, my friend, just open your eyes. The print of the hyena is longer. And look at those toes. Don’t you see the nails?” My honest replay would always be a firm “no”. Sorry.

I am even less qualified to risk an opinion on the tracks of smaller animals. Rather let people assume you are stupid, than to open your mouth and prove them right! It remains a good motto. Fortunately, my wife works hard to expand her knowledge and become better equipped to identify prints – and even manure. She does not need any encouragement either to state her views, and she is seldom wide of the mark.

Footprints of a baboons mistaken for a lion

Because I am well aware of my own ignorance, I don’t scoff at a person like Hans Wilreker when he makes a little mistake. Hans, who also owns a house in Wildevy Avenue, knows the bush. One morning he noticed unusual tracks. Large ones, about one metre apart. The book by Clive Walker Signs of the wild was consulted. It gave a few options. But Hans did not hesitate for one moment: the tracks must be a lion’s. He sped off to the office and carefully made a sketch on a notepad. Exactly the right size. His interested audience all agreed. Lion, most definitely. David Zeller was informed. He and four field wardens hastily set off in two vehicles to Wilreker’s home, one approaching from the east and the other from the west. At the corner of Worsboom and Wildevy Avenues they stopped. They found the prints and quickly identified them.

“Baboon,” David announced, a wry smile on his face. “No, make it two baboons,” Hans replied, in acknowledgement, “mine, and those of the fat baboon who made the print.” He added laconically: “I’m going to leave him a pair of tackies to avoid future confusion!”

Hans was not so far off the mark, really. Have a look at the huge print the front foot of a large baboon leaves. Furthermore, at that very same spot Tokkie and I did find lion tracks in 1998 – the introduction to a day full of bush-excitement we won’t easily forget. (Read more about it in the first chapter, High Five).

Leopard tracks are more plentiful

Almost every morning when we go for a walk, Tokkie points them out to me. Most plentiful, of the tracks of all predators, are those of hyenas. These animals with their erratic trot, scan the bush from early morning onwards. When the moon is out, genets start searching for food. They are joined by other kittens that cannot be tackled without gloves. All of them leave “fingerprints”.

Just to add to the confusion, a cheetah from the Sabi Sand left its mark in Sabiepark in May 2004. Even wild dogs paid a visit. The track of the wild dog can remind a layman like me of the hyena. Or of a large domestic dog.

What is the moral of the story? Firstly, don’t be too clever unless you have really studied prints. Secondly, mind your step 24 hours a day. The bush and its traffic are unpredictable. It never sleeps. The criss-crossing of fresh pad prints all over the park is irrefutable proof that this statement is true.

Lion, only periodically, cross the border. Visits by wild dogs occur even less often. With these two natural enemies out of the way, and no hunters worrying them, Sabiepark has become a popular playground of the hyena. It goes where it wants to, when it wants to. It slouches about in its own peculiar way.

Hyenas might even drop in “for breakfast”.

Our lapa was surrounded by not less than four of them one morning while I, wearing only rugby shorts, was having my nourishing breakfast porridge outdoors. The spectators seemed to be fascinated by the activity of eating with a spoon or by the pinkish bulk of the large man. I did not enjoy the attention – in broad daylight too! – and thanked my lucky stars for the relatively new lattice fence dividing us.

That same evening I saw Tokkie, petrified, sitting near the other lapa (sans lattice fence) at 17:15, enfolded in a haze of stink after a hyena slinked past – you smell him before you see him. Two days later we took a photo at roughly the same time and exactly the same spot: a hyena inspecting my fire intently to reconfirm its interest in the Wildevy larder.

Other owners reported similar incidents: of hyenas sniffing around on their stoeps; “like huge bears”, their forefeet on a window sill, peering through bedroom windows, or even knocking off the lid of a pot to enjoy the meaty contents noisily.

Visits early in the afternoon are a bit unusual. Later on, in the evening, it would be safe to bet on a hyena paying its respects. Only the times of those visits vary. One reason: hyenas frequent different routes every night. Another: animals do not have watches! Sometimes a hyena arrives when the meat is still sizzling on the coals. At other times your dinner has just been removed from the fire, when one hears a rustling sound… and smells – stink!

If you should hear a hyena at night – howling, barking, cackling, yelling, crying or laughing – you know you are in the bush. This unnerving cacophony is not at all musical, but it is a true sound of the African night. It’s wild. One can identify with it. On our first few visits to Sabiepark, these sounds were the only indications that one or more of these loud animals were around. At a later visit, “Ouma Marietjie” reported that “something resembling a large dog” had passed the sliding door of her bedroom in the moonlight. Then three stoep cushions mysteriously disappeared one night. We found the scraps after a while, scattered all over the erf. The “large dog” made himself more at home every day.

The first confrontation, face to face, was at the back stoep. While I was turning the “boerewors” and chops for the last time, Marisa shouted excitedly: “Hy—e—na”. “Where? Where?” It stood only a few steps away. We looked at it. It stared at us. Brent and I simultaneously dropped our torches and braai tongs to get to our cameras. This gave the visitor a bit of a fright, which made it move out of the circle of light. It went and lay under a tree, its head on its front legs. Just like a dog. (Its footprint is a very “doggish” print. It hides meat fairly deep under water, almost like a dog hiding bones under the sand. It normally selects water where there are no crocodiles – clever dog!) In any case, I lifted the grid one notch and awaited the “dog’s” next move. I did not have to wait long. It stood up and moved closer to the fire. There it hung around, giving the chefs-cum-photographers enough time to photograph it in various poses.

That one was probably a veteran of many battles

The camera revealed that it had only one eye. We could also detect various other battle scars. For at least the next two vacations we could identify “our” hyena by its markings. At a third vacation a younger one took its place, somewhat more “handsome” with fewer battle scars. What happened to “One-eye”, nobody knows. I don’t worry too much.

The substitute soon settled in, and on occasion even brought along two friends for company. This is not exceptional. Hyenas are quite hospitable and tolerant towards their own flesh and blood. Males, I believe, even undertake love-making expeditions as a team. Any bitch on heat is then loved into submission. They don’t seem to have conscientious objections about trespassing on sexual properties.