The Birmingham Males

[Spalea]

@Majingilane: I'm now totally convinced there is no division of roles inside the lions pride. Male lions hunt as often as the females do. And yes I'm totally convinced that most encyclopedias and books were and are lying about this fact. But, more amazing, we were perhaps quite persuaded about that, so persuaded that, unconsciously, into Africa, people went seeing these animals with such preconceived ideas and bias. They didn't want to check it these assertions were true or false.

When I was child (1965-1970 years) I read "Lioness hunt, males do nothing but fertilizing them". After at the beginning of the 70', thank to Schaller, I learnt that the males were very important within the pride: They defend the territory, but the lionesses are in charge of hunting and breeding of the cubs. That implicated, without I read it, that young males also learnt to hunt and, thus, when they were expelled from the pride, had to hunt for surviving. But of course, they were told with some emphasis that when they were in charge of a pride, they did no longer hunt. Except in order to deliver the final death kiss after the lionnesses have realised the main part of the hunt.

But even now, with the advent of the internet and the youtube movies, detailed accounts and so on we can still read "male lions can hunt but they are not good at this, because their mane and their bigger size handicape them".

All these things were totally wrong. Males hunt as often as the females do, and their bigger strength allows them to kill bigger preys. Perhaps because of their bigger size, they prefer to hunt within zones of denser vegetation, but that is be the only one concession that I would do and accept.

In addition of that, the male lions are quite opportunist. As it is said in the last video you show, you can see them deeply sleeped, and the minute after, they are on the hunt. And this very efficiently. Reply