Striped Hyena

The striped hyena is one of the four living species in the hyena family, together with the spotted hyena, the brown hyena and the aardwolf. Its scientific name is Hyaena hyaena, and it is the only living member of the genus Hyaena. It is the smallest of the three bone cracking hyenas, and its skull and teeth are a little less massive than those of its relatives, but it shares their powerful jaws. It is also the most widespread hyena and the only one that lives beyond Africa: its range covers the Sahel and North Africa, East Africa south to Tanzania, the Arabian Peninsula, the Middle East, Turkey, the Caucasus, Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent. Several subspecies have been described across this huge range, including the Arabian striped hyena of the Arabian Peninsula and the Syrian striped hyena of the Levant, although experts still debate how distinct they really are. Hyenas look a lot like dogs, but they belong to a separate family on the cat side of the carnivore family tree, closer to mongooses and civets than to wolves. The striped hyena has lived alongside people for thousands of years, and it appears in the folklore of almost every region where it lives, often as a creature of the night linked to graves and magic.

The striped hyena is a medium sized carnivore, somewhere between a large dog and a small lioness in build. Adults weigh from about 22 to 55 kilograms, with an average of around 35 kilograms, measure about 85 to 130 centimeters from nose to the base of the tail, carry a bushy tail of 25 to 40 centimeters and stand about 60 to 80 centimeters at the shoulder. Males and females are about the same size, and hyenas from the Middle East, Central Asia and India tend to be larger than those of Arabia and East Africa. The body is short and powerful, set on long legs, and the front legs are longer than the back legs, so the back slopes down toward the tail. The coat is coarse and gray, sandy or yellowish, crossed by black stripes on the body and legs, with a black patch on the throat and a dark muzzle. The ears are very large and pointed. A mane of long, stiff hairs, up to about 20 centimeters long, runs from the back of the head to the base of the tail, and when the hyena is frightened or angry it raises the mane and arches its back, which makes it look much larger. In winter the coat grows thick and soft, while in summer it becomes short and rough.

Striped hyenas live in a long belt of dry country that stretches from Senegal and Morocco across North Africa and the Sahel to Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania, and from there through Arabia, the Middle East and Turkey to the Caucasus, Central Asia, Pakistan, India and Nepal. The IUCN lists the species as resident in 39 countries. They prefer open or lightly wooded dry land: savannas, thornbush, scrub, rocky hills, semidesert and the edges of farmland, and they have been recorded at up to about 3,300 meters. They avoid dense forest and the most barren parts of the great deserts, and they need water within reach, since a scavenging diet makes them drink more than most carnivores. Caves, rock crevices, burrows and thick bush are essential for resting during the day. In most of the range the population is patchy and scattered, especially in West Africa, the Sahara, parts of the Middle East, the Caucasus and Central Asia, but the species is more continuous across large parts of Ethiopia, Kenya and Tanzania. India is one of its strongholds, with an estimated 1,000 to 3,000 animals in places such as Gir, Sariska and the dry grasslands of Rajasthan and Gujarat. Home ranges are usually a few dozen square kilometers, about 44 to 72 in the Serengeti and 61 in the Negev.

The striped hyena is mainly a scavenger. It feeds on the carcasses of wild and domestic animals at every stage of decay, and it eats what other predators leave: bones, cartilage, ligaments and marrow. Its jaws are strong enough to splinter the thigh bone of a camel, and it crushes long bones into small pieces and swallows them, so much calcium passes through its body that its droppings turn white very quickly. It is not a fussy eater, although it seems to avoid vulture meat. It also kills small animals it can overpower, such as hares, rodents, reptiles and birds, and it eats insects and a lot of fruit. Diets change a great deal from place to place. In Turkmenistan striped hyenas have been recorded eating wild boar, wild asses, porcupines and tortoises, in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan the fruit of the oleaster tree is a seasonal staple, and in the Caucasus they eat many grasshoppers. In Israel and Jordan they live largely on garbage, carrion and village waste. Only the larger hyenas of the Middle East, Central Asia and India are known to attack big prey, running it down and biting at the flanks. Hyenas with cubs carry food back to the den.

Striped hyenas are creatures of the night. They usually leave the den only when it is completely dark and return before sunrise, and in many places people live near them for years without ever seeing one. For a long time they were described as solitary, but their social life turns out to be more varied. Most of the time they are seen alone or in pairs, and groups of up to seven have been reported in Libya. In Laikipia, Kenya, a genetic study found that the small groups always had just one adult female, defended by up to three males that were often not related to her. In the Negev desert of Israel, camera traps showed that several adults met each other far more often than expected by chance, especially around scarce water. Home ranges of neighbors often overlap, and the species is not strongly territorial. Striped hyenas communicate mostly by smell, pasting a strong smelling secretion known as hyena butter onto grass, stones and tree trunks. They are much quieter than spotted hyenas, but they can growl, whine and make a cackling sound. When attacked, a striped hyena raises its mane, and if that fails it may lie still and play dead, then get up and run once the danger has passed.

Striped hyenas raise their young in dens, which they dig themselves or set up in caves, rock crevices and old burrows of other animals, and some dens in caves are used for many years. In many populations a male and a female share the den and both help raise the cubs, and the male brings food to the female and later to the young. The breeding season depends on the region: in the Caucasus they mate in January and February, while in southeastern Turkmenistan they mate in October and November, and in captivity they breed at any time of year. After a pregnancy of about 90 to 91 days, the female gives birth to a small litter, usually of one to four cubs. Newborn striped hyenas look very different from spotted hyena cubs: they already have the striped pattern of the adults, their ears are small and their eyes are closed. The eyes open after seven or eight days, and the cubs leave the den for the first time at about one month old. They are weaned at around two months and are then fed by both parents, who carry pieces of carcasses back to the den. By their first autumn they are about half the size of the adults. In the wild, striped hyenas can live about 12 years, and in zoos they have reached 23.

The striped and spotted hyenas share a name and a family, but they are very different animals. The spotted hyena is bigger, usually 40 to 64 kilograms or more, while the striped hyena averages about 35 kilograms. The spotted hyena has round ears, a spotted coat and no mane to speak of, while the striped hyena has huge pointed ears, black stripes and a long mane that it can raise like a crest. Their social lives could hardly be more different. Spotted hyenas live in large clans led by females, hunt wildebeest and zebras in groups and fill the night with whoops and giggles. Striped hyenas live alone, in pairs or in tiny groups, rely mostly on scavenging, fruit and small prey, and are almost silent. Their ranges overlap only in parts of East Africa and the Sahel, from Ethiopia and Kenya to Tanzania and from Senegal to Chad, and where they meet, the spotted hyena dominates. The striped hyena makes up for its smaller size with a far wider range: it is the only hyena found in Asia, from Turkey and Arabia to India. Its closest relative is not the spotted hyena but the brown hyena of southern Africa, which shares its pointed ears, mane and striped legs but has a plain dark coat.

In normal circumstances striped hyenas are extremely timid with people, and most run away as soon as they notice someone, although they can behave more boldly at night. Attacks on humans are rare, but they have happened, almost always on children or people sleeping outdoors. In the 1880s, hyenas in the Erivan Governorate, in today's Armenia, wounded 25 children and 3 adults in a single year, and there are later records from Azerbaijan and southeastern Turkmenistan. In India, nine children were thought to have been taken by hyenas in Bhagalpur, Bihar, over six weeks in 1962, and 19 young children were killed in Karnataka and Bihar in 1974. Yet in a five year count of wild animal attacks in Madhya Pradesh, hyenas caused only three, far fewer than wolves, wild boar, sloth bears, leopards or tigers. Far more common is the hyena's habit of digging up graves, which in places like Turkey led people to place heavy stones on tombs. That habit, together with old stories linking hyenas to magic and witchcraft, explains much of the fear and hatred they face. Body parts are still sold for traditional medicine and sorcery in North Africa and South Asia, and many hyenas are poisoned or trapped because they are wrongly blamed for killing livestock.

The striped hyena is not classed as endangered, but it is in trouble. The IUCN lists it as Near Threatened in its global assessment, made in 2014 and published in 2015, with an estimated 5,000 to 9,999 mature animals and a decreasing trend, and it notes that the assessment needs updating. In the Mediterranean region the IUCN considers it Vulnerable. The species is thought to be possibly gone from Kuwait, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, and its presence is uncertain in Sudan, Somalia, Eritrea and several West African countries. The main threats are direct persecution, poisoned baits set for wolves, jackals and stray dogs, the loss of wild prey and of the carcasses left by large predators, road deaths and hunting for body parts used in traditional medicine and sorcery, a problem documented in Morocco and other countries. In Central Asia the species hangs on in tiny numbers: Uzbekistan has an estimated 30 to 40 animals, all in the mountains of Surkhandarya, and in Tajikistan it was long thought extinct until a sighting in 2017. In March 2026, at the meeting of the Convention on Migratory Species in Campo Grande, Brazil, governments adopted a concerted action for the striped hyena in Central Asia, proposed by Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.