Tessa Koumoundouros at Science Alert:
With their bladed paws, wielded by a rippling mass of pure muscle, sharp eyes, agile reflexes, and crushing fanged jaws, lions are certainly not a predator most animals have any interest in messing with. Especially seeing as they also have the smarts to hunt in packs.
“Lions are the biggest group-hunting land predator on the planet, and thus ought to be the scariest,” conservation biologist Michael Clinchy from Western University in Canada said in 2023.
But in over 10,000 recordings of wildlife on the African savannah, 95 percent of the species observed responded with far more terror to the sound of an entirely different beast. This animal isn’t even technically an apex predator. It’s us: humans.
More here.
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