Monday, March 8, 2010

AFRICAN WILD DOGS


Wild dogs are commonly found in Africa.Eventhough they are very lean and small, as a pack they can be devastating as any other predator. They live and hunt together in large numbers which make them a potential threat for any animal. Wild dogs are even known to attack tigers. They live in a well organized and social way with almost every adult taking care of the pups and giving alerts to others. Wild dogs raise their young in the abandoned dens of other animals and they change their dens periodically. Pups grow very fast and assist the adults in the hunting process from young age. They have a phenomenal strike rate in hunting with almost 80% hunts ending in success. Unlike many other predators wild dogs start eating their prey before it dies. They can reproduce at anytime of the year and a single litter may contain 2 to 19 pups. Wild dogs are known to hunt large animals like wildebeest, African buffalo and giraffe calves. Like many fascinating animals that we see in the wild today wild dogs are also endangered because of human over population. Because of the fact that they require large areas of forest and the struggle to hunt in the presence of other predators their numbers are really declining. Lions are well known to kill wild dogs without any hesitation and most often they just kill them without taking them as a food source.