Scientists have revealed new insights into the diet of the notorious Tsavo man-eating lion after analyzing clumps of hair found on the predator’s teeth.
In 1898, a pair of male lions killed and devoured dozens of workers during the construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in Kenya, killing at least 35 people. They stalked and terrorized the workers for nine months until they were shot dead later that year. Their remains have been kept at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago ever since.
In a new study, scientists extracted DNA from clumps of hair found on lion teeth.
Their findings identify six species of prey and raise new questions about the distribution of lions in Kenya at the time they were alive.
“We found mitochondrial genetic material in giraffe, human, oryx, waterbuck, wildebeest and zebra prey, and also identified fur that came from the lions themselves,” said study co-author Alida, a biologist at the University of Illinois at Urbana. Mr de Vlaming said. Champaign told Live Science in an email. The researchers published their findings on Friday (October 11) in the journal Current Biology.
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They performed genomic analysis of the hair and extracted mitochondrial DNA from four individual strands and three hair clumps. They then compared that genetic profile to a list of potential prey species created from previous research to determine which species the lion may have hunted during its lifetime.
“One of the surprising discoveries was the identification of wildebeest fur,” de Vlamin said. Researchers believe the lion would have had to travel 90 kilometers to reach the nearest wildebeest grazing area (conocaetes), raising questions about the extent of the Tsavo lion’s habitat. “This suggests that either the Tsavo lion migrated further than previously thought, or that wildebeest were present in the Tsavo area at the time,” de Vlamin explained.
The Tsavo lion was spotted throughout an 8-mile (13-kilometer) workers’ campground in Tsavo National Park, east of Mount Kilimanjaro. Lion territory sizes range from 20 to 400 square miles (50 to 1,000 square kilometers), depending on prey and water availability. If prey is sparse, lions will venture further to find other resources.
First of two Tsavo man-eating lions (FMNH 23970) shot and killed by Lt. Col. Patterson. (Image credit: Field Museum, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons)
In their study, researchers found that the two lions abandoned the area for several months between attacks, during which time they migrated to more productive environments where prey was more abundant and wildebeest were present. He points out that it could have been done.
The researchers also said the absence of buffalo DNA was unexpected. A previous study in 2015 identified one buffalo hair from each lion, but this metagenome analysis did not identify any buffalo hair.
The African buffalo (Syncerus caffer) is one of the main prey animals of lions in the Tsavo region. According to the study, the two Tsavo lions may not have preyed on wildebeest. The buffalo population has declined due to an infectious viral disease called rinderpest that has spread among cloven-hoofed animals in the area. “Rinderpest entered Africa in the 1890s, killing about 90% of cattle and similarly affecting buffalo,” de Flamin said.
Genome studies of the maneless Tsavor lions confirm that they are likely siblings. (Image credit: Photo by Michael Jeffords and Susan Post)
Scientists still don’t know exactly why the Tsavo lions hunted humans.
Some reports suggest that these lions ate up to 135 humans, but stable isotope analysis of Tsavo lion hair and bones found that they ate about 35 humans, which is 1. The head accounts for about 35% of a lion’s diet and about 13% of a lion’s diet. The second is according to a 2017 study.
According to one theory, lions developed the habit of eating humans because the buffalo and cattle populations plummeted due to the rinderpest epidemic.
Another theory suggests that this behavior may have started due to painful tooth lesions found in the jaws of the two lions, which made it extremely difficult to catch large prey.
De Vlaming explained that the layers of fur found on the Tsavo lion’s jaw provide a timeline of the lion’s dietary history leading up to the attack. Further analysis could allow scientists to track changes in lion diets over time, potentially revealing when and why humans became targets.
