The BBC reports that officials in Tanzania recently shot and killed a lion believed to be responsible for as many as 35 deaths in that country. Lion attacks on human beings is simply a fact of life in Tanzania, which as more lions than any other African nation, but a lion killing as many as 35 people is simply extaordinary. According to the BBC, its probably the highest number of people killed by a single lion ever recorded.
So why did this lion decide to target humans, apparently to the exclusion of other prey?
Post mortem analysis of the lion’s corpse revealed that he had a shattered molar that had a horrible absess. Wildlife officials speculate that the absess may have made hunting and eating buffalo and other wild game too painful, so the lion decided to stick with the softer, chewy human beings. According to the BBC,
“This lion probably experienced a lot of pain, particularly when it was chewing,” said Rolf Baldus, coordinator of the wildlife programme of GTZ, the German development cooperation agency which has been working with the Tanzanian government on wildlife conservation issues for the past 17 years.
“It probably gave up hunting wild animals like buffalo because the meat was just too tough and too painful to chew. It almost certainly found humans easier to catch and less painful to eat.”
My kingdom for a carapace.
Source:
Toothache ‘made lion eat humans’. Daniel Dickinson, BBC, October 19, 2004.
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