Spotted Hyena in Tsavo

I photographed this Hyena wandering around in the daytime near the Voi River. It seemed very relaxed and I captured this great moment as it sniffed the air. Looks like it has a smile on its face too!

Hyenas have a rather bad reputation around the world (perhaps it's a Lion King's influence?) which I think they don't deserve. Usually thought of as scavengers eating 'leftovers' but not many people are aware that they also highly competent hunters and will pursue game over large distances at high speeds. They will also set out to hunt a particular species of prey, pick out specific individuals to hunt and adapt their hunting style to their prey type.

They have incredibly complex social lives. They live in female dominated clans where the lowest ranking females outrank the highest ranking males and where cubs inherit their mother's social status.

These communities are very different to any other carnivorous mammal communities in their social structure and are more similar to some primate groups.