40 Fun Facts About African Buffalo

Which grim nickname do hunting circles give the African buffalo for its grumpy, unpredictable temper?

Black Death is hunters' shorthand for an animal that can blindside its pursuers. A buffalo can also run at up to 37 miles per hour.

The 'Big Five', which includes the African buffalo, first meant the five hardest animals to hunt how?

On foot was how big-game hunters ranked the lion, leopard, elephant, rhino and buffalo as the hardest quarry. Today the five are more often targets for safari cameras.

In the viral video Battle at Kruger, which predators try to steal a buffalo calf from the lions?

Crocodiles had a brief tug of war with the lions, then gave up. The herd then returned, tossed a lion into the air and the calf walked back to it alive.

Which African bird rides on a buffalo's back, eating lice, fleas and other parasites from its skin?

The oxpecker gets a meal and a lift at once, though it also pecks at wounds to drink blood. Night cameras have even caught the birds roosting on buffalo.

American bison are often called buffalo, but which feature do they have that the African buffalo lacks?

A beard is the quick field mark: bison have one and buffalo don't. The two sit in different genera, and early American settlers probably muddled the names.

Adult female African buffalo 'vote' on where the herd should graze next by doing what while it rests?

Gazing in one direction is a silent ballot: cows stand, stare the way they want to go, then lie back down. If the vote is split, the herd may split too and rejoin days later.

The Cape buffalo and the rest of the Big Five have appeared since the 1990s on which South African items?

Banknotes gave each of the Big Five its own value, with the buffalo on the blue 100-rand note. A 2018 commemorative series swapped the animals for scenes from Nelson Mandela's life.

African buffalo bulls spend hot afternoons wallowing in what, which also rids them of ticks?

Mud does double duty as coolant and pest control, smothering parasites that latch onto the skin. The smaller forest buffalo wallows more in the dry season.

Which East African country held an estimated 240,000 Cape buffalo in 2021, more than any other nation?

Tanzania is the Cape buffalo's stronghold, yet it is also one of only two countries where numbers have noticeably dipped since 1998. Zimbabwe is the other.

The small forest-dwelling African buffalo keeps which coat colour for life, unlike its dark savanna cousin?

Red is the colour many calves start with, and the forest buffalo usually keeps it as an adult. It is also the smallest subspecies, at well under half the weight of a big savanna bull.

Like domestic cows, African buffalo bring swallowed grass back up to chew again, a habit called chewing what?

Cud gets a second grinding so the animal can wring more nutrients from tough stems. Feeding and ruminating fill 17 to 19 hours of a buffalo's day.

Among African buffalo, whose horns can span well over a metre, which animals grow them?

Both sexes are armed, though a cow's horns are narrower and smaller. Calves are born with small stubs that grow straight for the first six to nine months.

What name is given to the small all-male bands African buffalo bulls form away from the main herd?

Bachelor groups let worn-out bulls recover on grazing the big herds can't reach. Young males join one at four or five, then return to a herd to compete for mates.

A big Cape buffalo bull, the largest kind of African buffalo, can weigh roughly how much?

900 kg is the top of the usual range for a bull, while cows reach about 500 kg. A newborn calf weighs roughly 30 to 40 kg.

Which livestock disease, eradicated worldwide in 2011, killed up to 95% of African buffalo in the 1890s?

Rinderpest is only the second disease in history to be wiped out, after smallpox. It reached Africa with imported cattle and crashed buffalo numbers across the continent.

What name is given to the hard shield where a mature African buffalo bull's horns meet on top of his head?

Boss is the name for that fused shield, which takes about five years to form and is heaviest in Cape bulls. Two bulls occasionally settle rank by crashing theirs together head-on.

Which author's 1936 short story ends with Francis Macomber shot dead as he faces a charging Cape buffalo?

Ernest Hemingway has Macomber, who fled from a lion the day before, finally stand his ground. His own wife's shot from the car hits him instead of the buffalo.

Which white bird follows grazing Cape buffalo to catch the insects and small animals they disturb?

The cattle egret chooses its hosts by walking pace, favouring animals that take about 5 to 15 steps a minute. Buffalo, zebra and wildebeest all fit.

Orphaned African buffalo calves of four to six months are sometimes taken in by which herd members?

Older cows sometimes act as 'nannies', adopting several orphans at once and watching over them like a mother. The calves in turn follow their adoptive mother's lead.

The IUCN placed the African buffalo in which conservation category as of its 2019 assessment?

Near Threatened reflects falling numbers: about 400,000 adults remain, and most savanna herds now live inside protected areas or neighbouring hunting zones.

In Swahili, a language spoken widely across East Africa, which word means buffalo?

Nyati is the everyday Swahili word, with mbogo as a synonym. Shona speakers further south use the very same word, inherited from a shared Bantu root.

African buffalo calves usually nurse from which position, letting the mother keep moving with the herd?

From behind, at the hindquarters, a calf can keep feeding while its mother walks on. Nursing bouts shrink from about ten minutes at one month old to five by six months.

When lions close in, a Cape buffalo often protects its vulnerable hindquarters by doing what?

Backing into a thicket leaves the lions only the horned end to deal with. They prefer to attack the rump to pull a buffalo down, so one that keeps facing them often drives them off.

Which family of cloven-hoofed mammals includes the African buffalo, cattle, sheep, goats and antelopes?

Bovidae members all grow simple, unbranched horns: a bony core under a permanent sheath of keratin. The family's earliest known member lived about 20 million years ago.

What kind of machine, built by a charity to carry 100 kg loads in rural Africa, is branded the Buffalo?

A bicycle named for the animal's strength and durability: World Bicycle Relief's Buffalo weighs 50 pounds and is assembled in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Kenya.

Several southern African countries fence off wildlife areas because wild buffalo carry which livestock disease?

Foot-and-mouth lingers in wild buffalo, which stops whole countries from being declared free of it for meat exports. The veterinary fences are criticised for disrupting wildlife movement.

African buffalo are a maintenance host for the bacterium that causes which disease, a threat to nearby cattle?

Tuberculosis can spread from infected buffalo to livestock, one reason ranchers see wild herds as a threat. Buffalo bred to be disease-free fetch very high prices in South Africa.

By clearing tall grass for the short-grass grazers that follow, African buffalo earn which ecological label?

Ecosystem engineer fits because a herd reshapes its own landscape. Buffalo can live off grass that most other grazers cannot reach or chew, leaving shorter pasture in their wake.

Before a herd enters unfamiliar ground, an African buffalo 'pathfinder' stands apart for minutes doing what?

Listening and smelling the air, for up to eight minutes, tells the scout whether a threat is near. It then leads the herd forward, heads a different way or simply stays put.

The African buffalo is the only living species in which genus, kept apart from Asia's water buffalo?

Syncerus split from the Asian buffaloes some six to ten million years ago. Its extinct members include a giant whose horns could measure three metres from tip to tip.

Anders Sparrman, who first described the African buffalo, had earlier sailed as a naturalist with which explorer?

James Cook took the young Swede aboard at the Cape of Good Hope in 1772 as an assistant naturalist for his second voyage. Sparrman was also a pupil of Linnaeus and an abolitionist.

After civil war in which country were no buffalo detected in aerial surveys of Gorongosa National Park until 2001?

Mozambique's Gorongosa held about 14,000 buffalo in a late-1960s aerial count. Hungry soldiers then shot thousands of grazing animals, and many large-mammal populations fell by more than 95 percent.

What is the lip-curling grimace an African buffalo bull makes after sniffing a cow's urine known as?

The flehmen response draws scent into a special organ above the roof of the mouth, telling a bull whether a cow is nearly ready to mate. Many hoofed mammals and cats do it too.

A lower-ranking African buffalo bull shows submission by lowering his head and putting his nose where?

Between his rival's hindlegs is about as humble as a bull can get, and he often bellows while he does it. Real fights are rare and break out only between evenly matched bulls.

Zakouma National Park, a stronghold of the Central African savanna buffalo, lies in which country?

Chad's Zakouma and Garamba in the Democratic Republic of Congo are the two strongholds named for this subspecies, whose range runs east as far as Ethiopia.

African buffalo herds split into subgroups and later reunite, which biologists call what kind of society?

Fission-fusion splitting happens mostly in the wet season, when food is plentiful, or when a herd simply grows too large.

Which family of African birds includes species named for following buffalo herds to feed on disturbed insects?

Weavers of the genus Bubalornis carry a name built from the Greek words for buffalo and bird. They pile up massive, untidy stick nests rather than neat woven ones.

The African buffalo's dental formula of 32 teeth shows that the species has none of which kind?

Upper incisors are absent from a buffalo's 32 adult teeth, as are upper canines. The last tooth to appear, an incisor-like lower canine, erupts at around five years old.

Who filmed Battle at Kruger, the famous clip of an African buffalo herd rescuing a calf from lions?

Visiting tourists shot the eight-minute clip with a digital camcorder from a game-viewing vehicle. A veteran wildlife filmmaker said professionals would have felt lucky to witness it.

West African masks depicting the African buffalo are mainly danced at which ceremonies?

Male initiations are the main stage for these horizontal masks, many of which blend animal, human and spirit in a single face.