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50 free Hyena trivia questions with answers — nature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This hyena trivia quiz starts by fixing what most people get wrong: hyenas are feliforms, closer to cats and civets than dogs, and the spotted hyena kills up to 95% of what it eats rather than scavenging. It covers all four living species (spotted, striped, brown and the termite-eating aardwolf), the female-dominated clan, the pseudo-penis, cubs born with open eyes and teeth, the 'laugh', bone-crushing jaws, rabies resistance, and how hyenas beat chimpanzees at a cooperation test. It also covers the hyena in human imagination: Aristotle's slanders, the hermaphrodite myth, werehyenas and the Bouda, witches riding hyenas in Tanzania, the hyena-feeders of Harar, Shakespeare's 'laugh like a hyen', the man-eaters of Malawi, and the biologist who sued Disney over The Lion King. Evolution questions cover the dog-like hyenas, the elephant-bone-splintering Pachycrocuta and the one hyena that reached North America. Every question was verified against a primary reference (mainly the Wikipedia articles on the hyena family and its species) and carries a citation.
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Q 01How many living hyena species are there?
Four
Spotted, striped, brown and the aardwolf, each in its own genus, making Hyaenidae one of the smallest mammal families.
Q 02Hyenas are more closely related to which animals, despite looking dog-like?
Cats and civets
They are feliforms; their dog-like build and hunting style are convergent evolution.
Q 03Which of the four hyena species is the odd one out, being an insect-eater?
The aardwolf
It laps up termites with a long, broad tongue and is the last survivor of the ancient dog-like hyena lineage.
Q 04How many termites can the insect-eating hyena species lap up in a single outing?
300,000
Its ability to digest the toxic terpenes of soldier termites is a leftover of ancestors that ate fetid carrion.
Q 05What does the name of the termite-eating hyena mean in Afrikaans and Dutch?
Earth-wolf
It is also called maanhaarjakkals, 'mane-jackal', and the termite-eating hyena.
Q 06In spotted hyena society, which sex is larger and dominant?
Females
Even a low-ranking female usually outranks the highest-ranking male, and cubs inherit their mother's rank.
Q 07What is unusual about the female spotted hyena's anatomy?
Her genitals closely resemble a male's
The clitoris forms a 'pseudo-penis' through which she urinates, mates and gives birth, which fed the ancient hermaphrodite myth.
Q 08Roughly what share of the animals a spotted hyena eats has it killed itself, rather than scavenged?
Up to 95%
It is an active pack hunter of medium and large ungulates, wearing them down in long chases.
Q 09A spotted hyena community is called what?
A clan
Clans can reach 80 animals and are fission-fusion societies, more compact than wolf packs but looser than wild dog packs.
Q 10The spotted hyena's social organisation most closely resembles that of which other animals?
Baboons and macaques
It has the largest group sizes and most complex social behaviour of any carnivore.
Q 11How are spotted hyena cubs unusual at birth among carnivorous mammals?
Born with eyes open and teeth erupted
They attack each other almost immediately; sibling fights kill an estimated 25% of hyenas in their first month.
Q 12What share of spotted hyenas are estimated to die of neonatal siblicide in their first month?
25%
It is worst in same-sex litters; surviving male cubs grow faster and are likelier to gain reproductive dominance.
Q 13How long is a spotted hyena's average gestation?
110 days
Dominant mothers dose their unborn cubs with extra androgens, which makes them more aggressive.
Q 21What do striped and brown hyenas do when attacked by lions or dogs?
Feign death
The spotted hyena, by contrast, defends itself ferociously.
Q 22Which hyena species is the rarest, with 4,000 to 10,000 left?
Brown
Also called the strandwolf, it is persecuted by farmers who wrongly assume it kills livestock it is only scavenging.
Q 23How is the spotted hyena classified by the IUCN?
Least Concern
Between 27,000 and 47,000 survive, though numbers are falling outside protected areas.
Q 24The striped hyena's range extends across the Middle East, Central Asia and which subcontinent?
Q 14In a cooperative rope-pulling test, spotted hyenas outperformed which animals?
Chimpanzees
Captive pairs learned to tug two ropes in unison without training, and experienced hyenas even helped novices.
Q 15Which large reptile has been observed hunting adult spotted hyenas?
The African rock python
Hyenas keep their distance from crocodile waters, but they had not been thought to be python prey.
Q 16Spotted hyenas are among the few mammals besides bats known to survive infection with which disease?
Rabies
High concentrations of antibodies in their saliva may explain it.
Q 17Where did hyenas originate 22 million years ago?
The jungles of Miocene Eurasia
The earliest known, Plioviverrops, was a lithe, civet-like animal.
Q 18Which was the only hyena ever to reach North America?
Chasmaporthetes
It survived there by evolving into a cheetah-like sprinter, avoiding the niches canids already held.
Q 19The extinct 110 kg mega-scavenger Pachycrocuta could splinter the bones of which animals?
Elephants
By 5 million years ago the bone-crushing hyenas dominated Eurasia's carcasses, mostly kills left by sabre-toothed cats.
Q 20How do hyenas mark their territories, unlike dogs?
By pasting anal-gland secretions on grass
The white, creamy paste smells like boiling cheap soap or burning and can be detected by humans several metres downwind.
India
It is Near Threatened and features in Middle Eastern folklore as a symbol of treachery.
Q 25Both spotted and striped hyenas have been recorded killing dogs how?
With one neck bite that leaves the skin unbroken
Their jaws are strongest at the canines and premolars, the teeth they use to crack bone.
Q 26Which animal is proportionately a stronger biter than the spotted hyena?
The Tasmanian devil
The spotted hyena's bite is famous, but several animals beat it pound for pound.
Q 27What makes up the striped hyena's limited vocal repertoire?
A chattering laugh and howling
The spotted hyena produces whoops, grunts, groans, giggles, yells, growls, laughs and whines.
Q 28What does the pitch of a spotted hyena's laugh indicate?
How old it is
High-pitched calls signal fear or submission; loud, low ones express aggression.
Q 29In Tabwa mythology of East Africa, the spotted hyena is a solar animal that did what?
First brought the sun to warm the cold earth
West African folklore is far less flattering, casting the hyena as immoral and dirty.
Q 30In Tanzania, witches are traditionally believed to use spotted hyenas as what?
Mounts
In the Mtwara Region a child born while a hyena cries is expected to become a thief.