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Post by PumAcinonyx SuperCat on Aug 20, 2023 17:34:08 GMT
Advise; stop saying "Cougar can kill bison" unless you specify bison calves. Yes, a cougar could in fact kill an unprotected bison calf. Look, you are fully permitted to say anything you wish regarding cougar and bison. Not just bison calves, but any bison to ever walk the earth in any physical condition can be immune to the strongest cougar to ever breathe in oxygen. All you have to do is say the word, and it will be so. I beg you, if you wish to stand by the belief that a cougar would get stomped by a bison even if the 2 animals were the same weight, or you believe a literal legion of 100 kg cougars is the minimum required to take out a sick, emaciated and starving bison calf, then by all means possible, go ahead. You have my blessings, and may sorrows and tribulations never depart from the life of any man who disagrees with you. Go forth and prosper! Please, take the liberty to even make a thread of your own. You can title it: "Cougar (A literal legion of 100 kg individuals) Vs American bison (A handicapped and malnourished calf)" in that exact wording. Look, I'll even get pictures for you to start the thread. I'll search the depths of the Internet to find a picture of a bison calf that suits your description, and I'll use a graphic design app to simulate a legion of cougars. |
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Post by Bolushi on Aug 20, 2023 20:02:40 GMT
On a serious note, everyone : I have already called it quits with my debunking of Bison King’s posts. And while this doesn't mean I am throwing in the towel, or accepting defeat or being outreasoned by you guys, it does mean I know that my view or stance is not defined by what anybody thinks of it or whether anybody agrees with it. I have said EVERYTHING I have to say on "Cougar vs Bison" in 3 different answers on Quora. So, I don’t owe anybody an explanation for why cougars are the ultimate bison-killing machine in the entirety of North America. The answers are there for you to read. It's your responsibility to read them and yours ALONE. You cannot be asking me for an explanation on something that I have already given. I don’t answer to you, and I am NOT accountable to anyone on this forum. So, don’t think you can be making demands of me as if it is my sacred duty to find actual accounts of cougars legitimately killing bison before I can be accepted or believed. Don't believe me. In fact, I beg you not to believe me. That's your business, not mine.
I have specified, and specified, and specified, and specified, and specified a thousand times over, 1) the circumstances under which I discuss "Cougar vs Bison", 2) What EXACTLY I mean EVERY SINGLE TIME I utter the words "Cougar can kill bison", so much that if "specify" was a living thing, it would literally tell me "stop bro, that's enough." I have given the most thorough explanations on: 1) Why I believe cougars can kill healthy adult bison 2) Why they do not prey on bison even though they both coexist (I even went so far as to use a REAL-LIFE case study of another big cat that NEVER preyed on another wild cattle species until the hindrance that forbade it from doing so was taken out of the way, and explained EXACTLY how that related to the situation with cougars and bison) 3) Why the "even grizzly bears and wolf packs don’t try it" proposition is null and void, again, using another REAL-LIFE case study involving another big cat and another bear, and another big cat and another canid species. 4) Why big cats are not proportionately stronger than cougars (save for possibly jaguars) 5) And how "Cougar vs Bison" is effectively a "bandwagon effect" in the path of EVERY OTHER big cat-wild cattle relationship that we see in other big cat-wild cattle ecosystems around the world. And yet I'm being asked by some petty-minded dudes who DELIBERATELY and WILFULLY choose to take my words out of context and ignore all the specifications that I have laid down from the very beginning of my argument, "Show us, Show us, Show us!!!" like thirsty vampires begging for blood. After barely over a year of being in the animal community, one lesson I have learnt painfully is that trying to forcefully convince anybody, trying to EXERT your will over theirs only leads to what is called "vexation of spirit", a state where you are dumbfounded and agonising within yourself, almost in a state of depression.
After all the experiences I have had, I know better than to continue this debate. Please everyone, you all have a will of your own, and you are free to believe whatever you will on "Cougar vs Bison", I am not going to put a noose around your neck for not aligning with my will. Please by all means possible, believe whatever you want.
I am NOT going to ever make mention of ANYTHING that pertains to any relationship between cougars and bison, or ANYTHING that talks about the 2 animals in the same sense, on this forum again (I will make one final post on Quora at the end of the year though, which will be my last on the "Cougar vs Bison" topic). The path to finding true freedom in any debate (whether on animals or any sphere of influence) is abiding by the principle: "You can have your say, but you don't always have your way." And I know better than to stray from it. I may disagree with you on this particular topic but I also do feel how painful that is. It's what I've been dealing with in "Dogo Argentino vs Cougar" mixed in with a bit of "Bulldog vs Bull" and "Dog vs Wolf" for the past 365 days and I estimate I've said the same thing, sometimes to the same people, 349291 times. It gets very very very annoying and sometimes not even worth doing. I often let people believe what they want nowadays. |
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Post by PumAcinonyx SuperCat on Aug 20, 2023 21:39:48 GMT
Bolushi Ahhh, know the feeling right? Thanks for the sympathy. It's very well appreciated.
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Post by grippingwhiteness on Aug 20, 2023 21:54:22 GMT
While on a serious note I think a tom cougar can take on a bison, the max it could set its eyes on is either a calf or a juvenile individual , the max would be a young specimen the size of cattle cougars have already killed but that's the absolute max, an adult bull is just too large .
On the other serious note people should watch their mouth before judging animals more majestic than themselves with human adjectives.
The cougar is a cat and therefore a self-preservation master sure, but you as a human have a way more ridiculous nature and for sure without your daddy gun you wouldn't dare to engage bare handedly not even a cougar's medium-easy prey which is a white tailed deer. Making you for sure a bigger coward than the cougar. As a human, one of the most cowardly species on a regular basis with rare exceptions (mostly war heroes or UFC fighters) beware of how you judge animals that behave on primordial instincts
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Post by grippingwhiteness on Aug 20, 2023 21:56:46 GMT
I'm sure supercat knows full well he is going completely against me with his cougar vs bison stance, I have written a lot about cougars not only being unable to kill bison but also being unable to kill cattle and boars. So he is not shying away from me at all, in fact I have been "the bitch" in this situation by not debating him when he is basically calling me out. I've been putting off stepping up to the plate, procrastinating even, I guess one could say. A "here we go again" feeling looming over my head. But full credit to supercat for asserting his position, and pretty damn strongly. I don't agree, but respect it nevertheless. I don't want to ban calling eachother "fags", it just goes against my ethos in general where calling a guy a fag is a fundamental god-given right as far as I'm concerned, BUT I do feel like there is an unnecessarily high level of vitriol or venom in the early stages of this debate. I get it, but also... sigh... we're just never gonna get anywhere if this is how we start. One thing I might hand to supercat... 1 on 1, healthy vs healthy, maybe the mountain lion really IS the closest thing to a bison killer out of north America's predators. But only because none of north america's extant predators are bison killers. I don't believe a wolf can actually take on a healthy bull bison, or bother it at all, and nor do I believe a brown bear can. I also don't believe a mountain lion can. HOWEVER... maybe, if we HAVE to pick one who is most likely to maybe defy the odds and kill a healthy adult bull bison 1 on 1, I dunno maybe it is a 220 lbs tom cougar, even though it can't actually do it. It may be closest I guess? Cougars have killed boar and cattle actually so they can do that. And brown bears have taken down bisons aswell, not adult healthy males from what I know but a young not fully grown grizzly has taken down an adult cow bison |
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Post by grampa on Aug 21, 2023 6:57:27 GMT
Do leopards stalk, ambush, and kill bull Cape buffalo in Africa or bull water buffalo in Asia?
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Post by Hardcastle on Aug 21, 2023 7:40:24 GMT
I'm sure supercat knows full well he is going completely against me with his cougar vs bison stance, I have written a lot about cougars not only being unable to kill bison but also being unable to kill cattle and boars. So he is not shying away from me at all, in fact I have been "the bitch" in this situation by not debating him when he is basically calling me out. I've been putting off stepping up to the plate, procrastinating even, I guess one could say. A "here we go again" feeling looming over my head. But full credit to supercat for asserting his position, and pretty damn strongly. I don't agree, but respect it nevertheless. I don't want to ban calling eachother "fags", it just goes against my ethos in general where calling a guy a fag is a fundamental god-given right as far as I'm concerned, BUT I do feel like there is an unnecessarily high level of vitriol or venom in the early stages of this debate. I get it, but also... sigh... we're just never gonna get anywhere if this is how we start. One thing I might hand to supercat... 1 on 1, healthy vs healthy, maybe the mountain lion really IS the closest thing to a bison killer out of north America's predators. But only because none of north america's extant predators are bison killers. I don't believe a wolf can actually take on a healthy bull bison, or bother it at all, and nor do I believe a brown bear can. I also don't believe a mountain lion can. HOWEVER... maybe, if we HAVE to pick one who is most likely to maybe defy the odds and kill a healthy adult bull bison 1 on 1, I dunno maybe it is a 220 lbs tom cougar, even though it can't actually do it. It may be closest I guess? Cougars have killed boar and cattle actually so they can do that. And brown bears have taken down bisons aswell, not adult healthy males from what I know but a young not fully grown grizzly has taken down an adult cow bison "Have killed" is not as powerful a testimony as it seems. They overwhelmingly don't kill, and the kills can therefore can be considered anomalous and not indicative of the pumas capabilities under normal circumstances. Its like the lynx killing the boar story which gets lynx fans so excited, neglecting the fact they absolutely don't kill boars despite overlapping through most of their range and boars being the most abundant and available prey we have lynx never killing boars and even starving to death while boars are everywhere because they absolutely can't kill boars. But yes one did once. So did a lone dingo a few times. A lone dingo also killed an asiatic buffalo a couple of times. Such cases are not the norm and are almost "wild goose chases" leading fervent enthusiasts far away from reality. In a court of law anomalous events which are not representative of the broader norm or statistical trends are dismissed as outliers, even if they are technically true, that is beside the point if the outlier is being used as representative of the norm and doesn't account for broader context and common patterns. Pumas show a very extremely strong pattern of avoidance to readily available cattle and mature suids. If they are the only available prey in a location the puma population has essentially no prey because they are not prey for pumas. Exceptional cases not withstanding. The not killing them is more significant than the exceptional instances where they did kill them, much more pertinent to any generalised characterisation of puma predatory capacity. This is admittedly a "hard sell" to an Ava community who has always relied most heavily on rare isolated "cases" as like the most powerful form of supporting evidence, I am gradually working towards sewing the seeds of a culture shift where we stop doing this because we are wrong to be doing it. We are straying from the path of reality at an ever expanding deviation. The truth comes from understanding what animals are actually doing most of the time across their range, day in day out, those activities and proclivities are actually sculpting and crafting the animal into what it is, and they tell us what it is truly built to do and where it stands. grampaNo. Leopards don't kill cape buffalo or asiatic buffalo or gaur. They also don't kill zebra. I believe there may be 1 or 2 anomalous kills on zebra. Not even sure about 2, and I think the one was not actually witnessed. Leopards do kill hogs, and in some parts do kill a good amount of cattle. But then in big other huge swathes of their range don't touch cattle at all, and I believe this is down to types of cattle. Cattle variation. Puma also seem to target hogs in some isolated locations, and similarly I am sure this is down to hog variation, which can be surprisingly high from region to region. In some wheat and sorghum country in australia you can lug the hogs with kelpies, and you will never lose bull arabs hunting these hogs. It is a known thing among the boar hunting community that they barely even count, they will talk about mountain boars, blackberry boars, lignum boars, top end boars, etc etc, because they are a totally different animal that fights back and kills dogs. The fact pumas never kill hogs in some areas; there are study areas where they are the most abundant prey by a factor of 10 -1 to every other prey species combined, and no recorded kills whatsoever over years of data collection, that is to me very jarring and crucial information, which is not over-shadowed by another area where pumas do prey on hogs. That just tells me the hogs are different, and a dingo or kelpie could kill them as well, and probably a lynx for that matter. Again, I can appreciate a lot of this is a hard sell, but I know I'm right and I know its true. I have to just continue working over probably years to make it more and more clear and undeniable. |
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Post by grippingwhiteness on Aug 21, 2023 15:27:33 GMT
Cougars have killed boar and cattle actually so they can do that. And brown bears have taken down bisons aswell, not adult healthy males from what I know but a young not fully grown grizzly has taken down an adult cow bison "Have killed" is not as powerful a testimony as it seems. They overwhelmingly don't kill, and the kills can therefore can be considered anomalous and not indicative of the pumas capabilities under normal circumstances. Its like the lynx killing the boar story which gets lynx fans so excited, neglecting the fact they absolutely don't kill boars despite overlapping through most of their range and boars being the most abundant and available prey we have lynx never killing boars and even starving to death while boars are everywhere because they absolutely can't kill boars. But yes one did once. So did a lone dingo a few times. A lone dingo also killed an asiatic buffalo a couple of times. Such cases are not the norm and are almost "wild goose chases" leading fervent enthusiasts far away from reality. In a court of law anomalous events which are not representative of the broader norm or statistical trends are dismissed as outliers, even if they are technically true, that is beside the point if the outlier is being used as representative of the norm and doesn't account for broader context and common patterns. Pumas show a very extremely strong pattern of avoidance to readily available cattle and mature suids. If they are the only available prey in a location the puma population has essentially no prey because they are not prey for pumas. Exceptional cases not withstanding. The not killing them is more significant than the exceptional instances where they did kill them, much more pertinent to any generalised characterisation of puma predatory capacity. This is admittedly a "hard sell" to an Ava community who has always relied most heavily on rare isolated "cases" as like the most powerful form of supporting evidence, I am gradually working towards sewing the seeds of a culture shift where we stop doing this because we are wrong to be doing it. We are straying from the path of reality at an ever expanding deviation. The truth comes from understanding what animals are actually doing most of the time across their range, day in day out, those activities and proclivities are actually sculpting and crafting the animal into what it is, and they tell us what it is truly built to do and where it stands. grampa No. Leopards don't kill cape buffalo or asiatic buffalo or gaur. They also don't kill zebra. I believe there may be 1 or 2 anomalous kills on zebra. Not even sure about 2, and I think the one was not actually witnessed. Leopards do kill hogs, and in some parts do kill a good amount of cattle. But then in big other huge swathes of their range don't touch cattle at all, and I believe this is down to types of cattle. Cattle variation. Puma also seem to target hogs in some isolated locations, and similarly I am sure this is down to hog variation, which can be surprisingly high from region to region. In some wheat and sorghum country in australia you can lug the hogs with kelpies, and you will never lose bull arabs hunting these hogs. It is a known thing among the boar hunting community that they barely even count, they will talk about mountain boars, blackberry boars, lignum boars, top end boars, etc etc, because they are a totally different animal that fights back and kills dogs. The fact pumas never kill hogs in some areas; there are study areas where they are the most abundant prey by a factor of 10 -1 to every other prey species combined, and no recorded kills whatsoever over years of data collection, that is to me very jarring and crucial information, which is not over-shadowed by another area where pumas do prey on hogs. That just tells me the hogs are different, and a dingo or kelpie could kill them as well, and probably a lynx for that matter. Again, I can appreciate a lot of this is a hard sell, but I know I'm right and I know its true. I have to just continue working over probably years to make it more and more clear and undeniable. Yea the Eurasian lynx killed a piglet or a juvenile specimen, no way it's taking on an adult boar. It doesn't have the mouth grappling or stamina of a boarhound of her same size (apbt for example) to actually exhaust to death a large boar, and its skull is also way too little to suffocate the massive neck of an adult boar. That's leopard league not eurasian lynx league and you'd be surprised I also debated, on YouTube (before joining carnivora), with an unnamed user that claimed to be from carnivora about that case. Very rude and raging debate with him, he suddenly disappeared and stopped responding after I asked him to provide the link to the study that confirmed the boar killed was a "fully grown individual".
The dude : disappears.
Do you have any evidence of that? I think not, it's not an adult board to my estimate.
Returning to the original topic, that's not how I look at general overview of interactions of predators with said ungulates and I don't think it's just a good way to look at overall statistics, either you word it bad or it's just wrong. I think you just word it bad.
"Cannot kill" means that it is scientifically totally impossible for A to kill B, in any way, under any occasion or circumstance be it ambush or a frontal attack. "A" simply does not have the physical requisites to be able to cause mortal wounds in a confrontation of any kind with B (adults only, excluding puppies of course), which would lead to a total failure as a predation attempt. Failure always. "A cannot kill B" has that "not" which expresses a total negation, which does not allow for exceptions precisely because it is a total negation. How is this denial supposed? In two ways 1) Guess: logical analysis of both animals is done, for many reasons of appearance and logic B is simply out of league of A's predation range. The reason? Well maybe because it is x30 bigger and because predators already bigger than A fail very often in trying to prey on B 2) It never happened and it was never recorded or witnessed.
As for, as you've already said here though, rightly so.
Puma also seem to target hogs in some isolated locations
And as confirmed here. 
True, while by no means the norm, boars are a viable prey and can be taken down by cougars. Even 59% of them can occupy cougar diet in that area, must be because they are so naturally invasive or just so abundant compared to other ungulates that cougars may decide to switch on them with more frequency compared to the north where they have way more easier preys at their disposal. Now, since cats don't like going after impressive and prime dangerous game unless they are desperate or occasional alien behavior, they will say "okay fuck hogs, I have a lot of easier prey so I won't take the risk".
With bull cattle, it has happened 2 times out of 100 years, correct, it's extremely rare, more rare than the birth of a zebra with a spotted coat.
By Carson Healy
"Thanks to my man Steve and his dogs for getting me my first lion. It killed a full grown bull a week ago and we finally caught up with it today. Craziest hunt I have ever been on!"
But it happened. It wouldn't have happened if the "cougar couldn't kill" the bull cattle because of the two reasons I listed above, but those two reasons don't have right of speech here since we have photographic evidence and witnesses for this. It happened, it means that under certain circumstances a male mountain lion that switches its taste for a second can take on and finish an adult bull cattle if it wants to. Will it always happen? Obviously no, I actually give it a success rate under 10% WITH ambush on its side since some bull cattles are very dangerous prey and they also have killed several wolves pumas including a monster twice their size) according to some records. But it can succeed and it did there. That's what matters to me. It can do it.
"Have leopards killed bull cape buffaloes? No"
True, no leopard has ever shown that it can kill an adult cape buffalo, too large and powerful for this cat. Even lone lions sometimes get killed or badly injured when confronted with these tanks.
" Have leopards taken on adult Guars? No."
True, gaurs get even larger than cape buffaloes and are sometimes even too formidable for tigers. Definitely out of range for a 110-184 lb Indian leopard, there's only a dubious account where a pregnant adult gaur cow and a male leopard were both found dead with mortally inflicted wounds and the forest officials said they believed the leopard successfully killed the gaur cow but later got raided and destroyed by the herd. I personally believe it a very, very dubious, very weird account.
"Water buffaloes? Nope"
Partially true, adult bull water buffaloes have never fallen to leopard predation, but they are less formidable and also inferior in size to cape buffaloes. Which means that their subadult individuals can become occasionally more vulnerable to leopard predation. Here a large male Sri Lankan leopard killed a near adult water buffalo considerably larger than itself (horns visible and developed) 
Another instance involving another near adult buffalo of unknown sex killed by a leopard
My milk man came to me and said that a buffalo was caught by a leopard in front of his eye, when he intervened the leopard left the prey and ran away but it was too late for the buffalo. He told me the carcass is still there and it might come back for it. I went to the spot and took a safe vantage point from a long distance to capture the same. The leopard obliged and came out to feast on the kill. It was late in the evening fading light and this image was shot from a long distance so had to crop hence the low quality. It was a moment to be captured and remembered. Nikon gears Valparai
"They also don't kill zebras"
False, totally false. Cougars have and do kill zebras aswell.
"WHAT? But cougars don't even coexist with zeb-"
Yes they do, invasive vs native relationship, we'll get to that later.
Leopards have preyed and killed adult zebras, even mares, on some occasions. In fact they can and do kill adult zebras.
This large male leopard killed a zebra mare that looks to be like 3 times its size despite being barely visible in the image. Male leopards, especially of huge size, are capable of strength feasts. Notice how the leopard looks pretty worn out which indicates it wasn't an easy feat to pull off even with elements of ambush.
"A few days ago a rather large male leopard killed a zebra right next to one of the roads. Since then people have been popping into the area every now and then with only the occasional sighting. What we found however blew our minds!
We edged towards the kill and there was one of the largest males I have ever seen feeding on his kill. This was no ordinary leopard sighting as he was extremely relaxed and seemed to also accept us as a part of his world. We all sat in complete awe of the beautiful spectacle that was unfolding right in front of us. No photography was also quite tricky as we had to contend with the spotlight but we all made the most of it and both Grant and I will hopefully be uploading quite a few more of the images to the Stock Library soon. We also got a short video clip of the male feeding which I will hopefully load onto YouTube soon and link to this Blog. Big Five Drive. Brilliant! Just when you thought it could not get bet any better and the fact that all the animals made you feel a part of the African story is what made it really special.
I could have turned this into a marathon post, and will probably refer back to it again, but I need to get going for this mornings drive so for now will leave you with a great quote from Sir Ian Maccallum which is exactly what you feel like after a day like today!
“Welcome home to your wild origins. Learn whatever you can from our animals, our wild coastlines and landscapes and from those who have identified themselves with this continent. Africa can teach you a lot about who you are and your place in the world. But you must come soon, before it's too late."
Check back soon for this week's High Five.
As always I look forward to hearing from you!
Gerry
Photo Africa at 6:31 AM
Another leopard, this time a young male, killed an adult zebra here 
"The actual event was witnessed by a colleague who confirms that the leopard came out of nowhere and caught the zebra totally by surprise."
Another instance 
Another instance where a fully grown adult zebra skeleton was found in a cave subsequently it was killed consumed by a leopard
source: de Ruiter, Darryl J., and Lee R. Berger. "Leopards as taphonomic agents in dolomitic caves—implications for bone accumulations in the hominid-bearing deposits of South Africa." Journal of Archaeological Science 27.8 (2000): 665-684.
This study is interesting to note since the Leopard killed many of these animals and managed to transport them into caves for storage. Very fascinating cats.
Another instance :
California cougars prey on feral zebra populations aswell, by the way. Keeping the growth of the population very restricted
True, leopards in certain areas are very frequent cattle killers, they also kill bulls. Large Boars are taken too: Persian, Sri Lankan and amur leopards have taken on large adult wild boars as well, one skull of a boar killed by an amur leopard exceeded 40 cm in length so a large boar.
You just worded bad in my opinion, I get your sense and I get what you're telling. It's just worded bad when you say "can't kill". For my interpretation of things I would simply say that boars and bull cattle for cougars are not the norm at all and that for 99% of their daily range and routine they don't even dare to attack them because they are too formidable and dangerous prey for them, and since felines are self persevationists well- But even if for 99% of their range and daily routine they don't, there is still that small 1% who remind us that under certain circumstances (desperation for lack of other prey or just an unusual abundance of hogs and probably cattle) a cougars CAN kill any of these animals, albeit very rare and probably with low success if they tried more frequently. The same thing goes for leopards with zebras, wild boars and cattle, only that leopards, given that in certain areas where they suffer much more from conflict with man, can specialize in large cattle killers (northern Iran and Namibia), while for zebras and wild boar depends on the area. For now we have Persian, Sri Lankan, Indochinese and even Amur leopards that have killed adult wild boars of considerable sizes. It's not the norm, pretty rare (counting Indochinese leopards out because they seemingly target boars with interesting frequency) , but they can prey successfully on them. That's what I'm talking about, not denying that this happens rarely, just that it happens and that's wrong saying that they "can't kill" such preys. Attachments:
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Post by grampa on Aug 21, 2023 16:50:49 GMT
It would be foolish, even suicidal, for a cougar to ambush a bull bison. Fact.
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Post by Hardcastle on Aug 21, 2023 17:16:21 GMT
grippingwhitenessGood post. Definitely more zebra kills than I thought, but they still amount to a handful of "cases" which I would still classify as anomalous. You're right, I am struggling to articulate what I mean very well on this issue, and that's why I am almost resigned to the fate of not successfully persuading people on it, yet. I need to work on explaining this point better and I expect it will take time. As in a long time of writing and re-writing the point over various posts for years until it is refined and streamlined. The arguments I have which are more solid and persuasive are that way because I have honed them over years and years. This is kind of a relatively new realisation for me. "Can't kill" is an overzealous assertion that IS disproven by these cases. That is a fair point. "Don't kill" is more what I mean, and I need to build the case for why this is significant. Which I may not successfully do today, or tomorrow, but I believe I will get there. Overwhelmingly in Africa zebras don't really need to worry about leopards. You can watch thousands of hours of African savannah predator prey interactions, and you will never see a leopard killing an adult zebra. You will see hungry leopards walking through fields with zebras who barely even care about the presence of the leopard. It's not something they even consider one of their predators. Add the hundreds of thousands of hours of field research and THEN yes you get these lets say 5 or 6 or whatever cases (didn't count) where actually a leopard did kill a zebra. I still consider them outliers. It seems like a lot, but it is really not when weighed against the hundreds of thousands of times when a hungry leopard could have targeted a zebra but didn't. On the same nature films we have lions constantly killing zebras, it must be their favourite target. I could easily go find not 6 or 7 or 25 cases of lions targeting zebras, but thousands. Some successful, some not, whatever, they have a clear predator/prey relationship. And keep in mind lions are relatively rare animals compared to leopards. We COULD focus on these 6 or 7 or whatever cases of leopards killing zebras, and they are fascinating and interesting cases which I think speak of beastly mature males reaching a level of experience and badassery where they start thinking outside the box and knowing they can elevate above typical predatory limitations wired into the psyche of most leopards. But focusing on those cases is IMO misleading yourself into seeing the leopard as "a zebra cat", when stepping back and looking at the bigger picture would expose this isn't accurate. It is mostly not. By a huge huge huge margin leopards mostly decide against even thinking about targeting an adult zebra. This isn't something that "has happened 7 times", it is something that is happening constantly, all day every day, thousands and thousands and thousands of times. Steadily, consistently and frequently leopards are deciding against targeting available zebras. I'm not talking about failing to kill them, I'm talking about blanking them out of their consideration all together. Most leopards most of the time, and I mean 99% of leopards 99.9999% of the time, are approaching zebra presence with that energy. With "I can't kill that" energy. These leopards that are doing it are freaky renegade maniacs. Weird analogy here, but consider Mahatma Ghandi. While all Indian people were just shrugging and frowning and being victimised by British occupation and not doing anything about it because they didn't feel they could. 1 guy was like "...no" and engaged in all sorts of protests and acts of civil disobedience and he was a leader who rallied people and was able to persuade them to follow his philosophies and teachings and mobilise in protest against British occupation. He was an outlier of a guy. It would be weird to be like "well you know what dudes are like, always starting revolutions using peaceful resistance and rallying a legion of followers with their teachings and philosophies", using mahatma ghandi as typical of generic human behaviour. No that's just the one dude. Or broadly you could say it has been a handful of dudes through the histories of our various cultures and societies, but definitely a fraction of 1 percent. Its not accurate to characterise humans as an animal that does that, because you need to also acknowledge the billions who don't do that. They are people too and they are more accurately representative of what normal people normally do - go with the flow, don't shake up the status quo, don't lead revolutions, etc etc. Again, weird analogy, but I really do think we fall into a trap of seeking out these impressive anomalous cases, they are what tend to catch our attention, and then we are like "YES! that is my favourite animal, that is what they do, that is indicative of how they behave, they are >insert cool thing< doers by design", and I just sincerely believe it is mistaken. I think we end up with every animal being misrepresented in a flattering way. And it is funny to me that dogs just get totally the opposite treatment (and humans, to an extent as well). They are typically as a rule characterised by the worst thing they ever did. Say a man traps a wild animal, shoots it in the stomach, and punches it in the face, and then urinates on it, and then sets a dog loose to chew it up while it dies. THAT becomes what dogs are in the minds of these same people who have every wild animal species elevated to the level of their top 0.0000001%. All the shitty things the wild animals did are completely ignored ... lets say a baby antelope with a broken leg whose mother was poisoned by poachers is stuck in the mud and a sneaky leopard comes over and starts eating it alive butt first. No one is ever like "THAT is leopards, typical, always cheating, always killing baby antelopes when they are down and out" etc etc. It doesn't even occur to anyone to hold that against the leopard, and it shouldn't, that would be crazy, but the rules for both are just so worlds apart when your focus with leopards is on macho super navy seal leopards who kill zebras, and cowardly perverted cretinous dogs whose owners cheat for them first before they attack something. The bottom 1% dogs vs the top 1% leopards... its a shit show. How about the normal day to day expectations on an animal? What they are normally doing most of the time, the level they need to be at to be a successful member of their kind and get by well enough to breed and raise offspring and etc. That's kind of more like the reality of the animal that nature has sculpted them to be. Impressive cases almost by definition are misleading, even if they are very real and true. Some leopards CAN kill zebras though, yes, your cases prove that. It is wrong to say "leopards can't kill zebras". Some evidently can. I think this phenomenon is very cool, and I've mentioned before there are some macho experienced male leopards who just have this special swagger where they go against the grain of leopard behaviour. They are leopards too and they are real things, so it is very difficult to cleanly extract the point I am trying to make from this complex dynamic soup of nuances that is the real world of animal interactions and animal adaptations. It's just, to me "what the average general population of a species normally does most of the time, day to day" has to count for something, and I feel it just gets TOTALLY neglected in favour of focusing on the more glamorous and sensational cases. For leopards this would be NOT attacking zebras, for pumas not attacking hogs, for both mostly not attacking full grown cattle and wild bovines. As true as the fact leopards "can kill zebras", at least it is also as true that leopards by and large do not kill zebras. Searching for leopard attacks on zebras... you did a good job, you found some, but in doing so you surely also noticed how hard they were to find. I look on youtube- one leopard snatching a baby zebra and evading the angry mother. One male leopard showing stalking behaviour towards zebras and making the zebras run, which leaves the experienced field researcher who witnessed it amazed because it is so unusual, in his own words "he stalked an adult zebra? WOW!"- It is factually accurate, your cases not withstanding, to say Leopard predation on Zebra is anomalous. Even 20 more cases won't actually change that. Until it is like lions who just always all day are constantly targeting zebras and you can't walk around youtube or national geographic or whatever without tripping over all the lion/zebra predation events, until then it is anomalous. Leopards mostly don't prey on adult zebra. But yes, some have. Cougars killing zebra... that is fascinating article and I didn't know about these wild californian zebras. Exotic animals forming wild populations in foreign locales is one of the most intriguing topics to me. Note it does specifically mention the "young" of zebras, but also... I actually have expressed in the past, an observation or even theory that cougars seem to over-achieve slightly against equids. They seem to prey on mustangs and peoples horses quite a bit, it seemed to me more so than leopards prey on zebras, and though I appreciate zebras are likely tougher and more hazardous fighters than mustangs I did find it interesting to entertain the possibility that pumas may have a knack for equids and a weakness against hogs, relative to leopards who might have a relative knack for hogs and a relative weakness against equids. Not super confident or sure about it or anything, just something I have kicked around in the past.
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Post by CoolJohnson on Aug 21, 2023 17:34:57 GMT
Do leopards stalk, ambush, and kill bull Cape buffalo in Africa or bull water buffalo in Asia? Unlike cougars, there are cases of leopards killing young wild cattle like Cape buffalo calves or sub-adult water buffalo. They even go for banteng, though that is based on scat. That being said, I am still doubtful whether a leopard can kill an adult of any of these species, unless if their health is compromised. I understand PumAcinonyx SuperCat's reasoning, but I am doubtful a leopard or cougar can take down an adult bison since these animals would give lions and tigers serious trouble. Also, where is PumAcinonyx SuperCat's profile picture from? |
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Post by PumAcinonyx SuperCat on Aug 21, 2023 18:10:02 GMT
I will answer in a bit, everyone. I'm getting my sources to already.
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Post by grippingwhiteness on Aug 21, 2023 19:00:26 GMT
grippingwhiteness Good post. Definitely more zebra kills than I thought, but they still amount to a handful of "cases" which I would still classify as anomalous. You're right, I am struggling to articulate what I mean very well on this issue, and that's why I am almost resigned to the fate of not successfully persuading people on it, yet. I need to work on explaining this point better and I expect it will take time. As in a long time of writing and re-writing the point over various posts for years until it is refined and streamlined. The arguments I have which are more solid and persuasive are that way because I have honed them over years and years. This is kind of a relatively new realisation for me. "Can't kill" is an overzealous assertion that IS disproven by these cases. That is a fair point. "Don't kill" is more what I mean, and I need to build the case for why this is significant. Which I may not successfully do today, or tomorrow, but I believe I will get there. Overwhelmingly in Africa zebras don't really need to worry about leopards. You can watch thousands of hours of African savannah predator prey interactions, and you will never see a leopard killing an adult zebra. You will see hungry leopards walking through fields with zebras who barely even care about the presence of the leopard. It's not something they even consider one of their predators. Add the hundreds of thousands of hours of field research and THEN yes you get these lets say 5 or 6 or whatever cases (didn't count) where actually a leopard did kill a zebra. I still consider them outliers. It seems like a lot, but it is really not when weighed against the hundreds of thousands of times when a hungry leopard could have targeted a zebra but didn't. On the same nature films we have lions constantly killing zebras, it must be their favourite target. I could easily go find not 6 or 7 or 25 cases of lions targeting zebras, but thousands. Some successful, some not, whatever, they have a clear predator/prey relationship. And keep in mind lions are relatively rare animals compared to leopards. We COULD focus on these 6 or 7 or whatever cases of leopards killing zebras, and they are fascinating and interesting cases which I think speak of beastly mature males reaching a level of experience and badassery where they start thinking outside the box and knowing they can elevate above typical predatory limitations wired into the psyche of most leopards. But focusing on those cases is IMO misleading yourself into seeing the leopard as "a zebra cat", when stepping back and looking at the bigger picture would expose this isn't accurate. It is mostly not. By a huge huge huge margin leopards mostly decide against even thinking about targeting an adult zebra. This isn't something that "has happened 7 times", it is something that is happening constantly, all day every day, thousands and thousands and thousands of times. Steadily, consistently and frequently leopards are deciding against targeting available zebras. I'm not talking about failing to kill them, I'm talking about blanking them out of their consideration all together. Most leopards most of the time, and I mean 99% of leopards 99.9999% of the time, are approaching zebra presence with that energy. With "I can't kill that" energy. These leopards that are doing it are freaky renegade maniacs. Weird analogy here, but consider Mahatma Ghandi. While all Indian people were just shrugging and frowning and being victimised by British occupation and not doing anything about it because they didn't feel they could. 1 guy was like "...no" and engaged in all sorts of protests and acts of civil disobedience and he was a leader who rallied people and was able to persuade them to follow his philosophies and teachings and mobilise in protest against British occupation. He was an outlier of a guy. It would be weird to be like "well you know what dudes are like, always starting revolutions using peaceful resistance and rallying a legion of followers with their teachings and philosophies", using mahatma ghandi as typical of generic human behaviour. No that's just the one dude. Or broadly you could say it has been a handful of dudes through the histories of our various cultures and societies, but definitely a fraction of 1 percent. Its not accurate to characterise humans as an animal that does that, because you need to also acknowledge the billions who don't do that. They are people too and they are more accurately representative of what normal people normally do - go with the flow, don't shake up the status quo, don't lead revolutions, etc etc. Again, weird analogy, but I really do think we fall into a trap of seeking out these impressive anomalous cases, they are what tend to catch our attention, and then we are like "YES! that is my favourite animal, that is what they do, that is indicative of how they behave, they are >insert cool thing< doers by design", and I just sincerely believe it is mistaken. I think we end up with every animal being misrepresented in a flattering way. And it is funny to me that dogs just get totally the opposite treatment (and humans, to an extent as well). They are typically as a rule characterised by the worst thing they ever did. Say a man traps a wild animal, shoots it in the stomach, and punches it in the face, and then urinates on it, and then sets a dog loose to chew it up while it dies. THAT becomes what dogs are in the minds of these same people who have every wild animal species elevated to the level of their top 0.0000001%. All the shitty things the wild animals did are completely ignored ... lets say a baby antelope with a broken leg whose mother was poisoned by poachers is stuck in the mud and a sneaky leopard comes over and starts eating it alive butt first. No one is ever like "THAT is leopards, typical, always cheating, always killing baby antelopes when they are down and out" etc etc. It doesn't even occur to anyone to hold that against the leopard, and it shouldn't, that would be crazy, but the rules for both are just so worlds apart when your focus with leopards is on macho super navy seal leopards who kill zebras, and cowardly perverted cretinous dogs whose owners cheat for them first before they attack something. The bottom 1% dogs vs the top 1% leopards... its a shit show. How about the normal day to day expectations on an animal? What they are normally doing most of the time, the level they need to be at to be a successful member of their kind and get by well enough to breed and raise offspring and etc. That's kind of more like the reality of the animal that nature has sculpted them to be. Impressive cases almost by definition are misleading, even if they are very real and true. Some leopards CAN kill zebras though, yes, your cases prove that. It is wrong to say "leopards can't kill zebras". Some evidently can. I think this phenomenon is very cool, and I've mentioned before there are some macho experienced male leopards who just have this special swagger where they go against the grain of leopard behaviour. They are leopards too and they are real things, so it is very difficult to cleanly extract the point I am trying to make from this complex dynamic soup of nuances that is the real world of animal interactions and animal adaptations. It's just, to me "what the average general population of a species normally does most of the time, day to day" has to count for something, and I feel it just gets TOTALLY neglected in favour of focusing on the more glamorous and sensational cases. For leopards this would be NOT attacking zebras, for pumas not attacking hogs, for both mostly not attacking full grown cattle and wild bovines. As true as the fact leopards "can kill zebras", at least it is also as true that leopards by and large do not kill zebras. Searching for leopard attacks on zebras... you did a good job, you found some, but in doing so you surely also noticed how hard they were to find. I look on youtube- one leopard snatching a baby zebra and evading the angry mother. One male leopard showing stalking behaviour towards zebras and making the zebras run, which leaves the experienced field researcher who witnessed it amazed because it is so unusual, in his own words "he stalked an adult zebra? WOW!"- It is factually accurate, your cases not withstanding, to say Leopard predation on Zebra is anomalous. Even 20 more cases won't actually change that. Until it is like lions who just always all day are constantly targeting zebras and you can't walk around youtube or national geographic or whatever without tripping over all the lion/zebra predation events, until then it is anomalous. Leopards mostly don't prey on adult zebra. But yes, some have. Cougars killing zebra... that is fascinating article and I didn't know about these wild californian zebras. Exotic animals forming wild populations in foreign locales is one of the most intriguing topics to me. Note it does specifically mention the "young" of zebras, but also... I actually have expressed in the past, an observation or even theory that cougars seem to over-achieve slightly against equids. They seem to prey on mustangs and peoples horses quite a bit, it seemed to me more so than leopards prey on zebras, and though I appreciate zebras are likely tougher and more hazardous fighters than mustangs I did find it interesting to entertain the possibility that pumas may have a knack for equids and a weakness against hogs, relative to leopards who might have a relative knack for hogs and a relative weakness against equids. Not super confident or sure about it or anything, just something I have kicked around in the past. I feel the same way as you do in this post, I can say we actually have the 100% exact same view on this topic by how you worded it. I started this argument only because I saw that "can't kill" sentence which obviously wasn't true but it was just worded bad, I perfectly knew what you actually meant but I was just making sure it was just the wording that caught me by surprise.
Yes, all those predations aren't the norm at all, it's very rare and as I also stated 99% of the time both cougars and leopards will target different prey which is way more in their league, and they know that. Both leopards and cougars have always fulfilled niche of secondary carnivores in the environments they have inhabited for hundreds of thousands of years (both were even subordinates to early jaguars in Europe), they have developed morphological adaptations to become proficient as agile and arboreal felids with yes more gracile bodies (when compared to BIG cats like jaguars, lions and tigers, sure leopards and cougars can grow to massive sized that rival the size of some average pantanal jaguars and young adult lionesses but still they are gracile when compared to said cats) who tackle most of the time medium-sized prey and avoid open spaces. Predators know their prey range and which prey is just too risky and dangerous for their league, cats especially. They're the epitome of cherry pickers, throughout their evolutionary journey they have adapted their sized and hunting tactics (and feeding tactics aswell, including lifting animals over trees) based on what they could prey without too much risk as they shrank to secundary predators. They will prey most of the time smaller prets that are easier to overpower related to their size,and as already demonstrated the more the size of the individual cat the bigger the preys it can take down. This works for populations and subspecies as a whole, the bigger the leopard/cougar population the bigger the prey species they feed on.
Although their prey range varies a lot, they still have a very big "average" range which says that 90% of the prey they tackle most of the time are medium sized ungulates. Then there's very exceptional and rare predation events of very impressive preys for both, moose and bull elk (the latter is pretty frequent though) for cougars and zebras, elands and even more rarely Okapis and near adult buffalo cows/males for leopards. Those are preys they almost never prey on because as self preservationists and especially as medium-game specialists they know they very likely will totally fail to kill one and will at the same time risk their life. That's not a thing they want to risk by trying to take on an animal much larger and more dangerous than the ungulates they are used to hunt and consume. That's where the "can't kill" thing could have made sense, by imagining how the leopard or the cougar thinks when it's hunting.
"I saw my mother hunting and dragging to my den these preys most of the time, she taught me how to kill nearly -dead specimens of this type and on my own I've also sperimented and have successfully killed these medium sized antelopes. Now that Zebra mare there is VERY LARGE, it looks very intimidating and it's almost FOUR times the size of me! I've been taught by my mother that the prey I've to feed on are antelopes and warthogs close to my size so that I can overpower them more easily with my strength and carry them on trees. Now that zebra mare looks just TOO LARGE for me, it's a giant! Imma head out, it's not my league, I can't kill this. Gonna stick to my gazelles and warthogs and occasionally some Wildebeest because although very large they seem to go down pretty easily"
Now this is very speculative but in my opinion this is what the average leopard would theorically guess and say as it sees an adult zebra, but individual mental variation obviously still exists. The occasional large badass male leopard that got used to hunt larger preys than usual (mara male leopards frequently kill adult Wildebeest three times their size, Shujaa is an example) with more frequency will start to view zebras (or eland cows), basically the same size as Wildebeest for the most part as viable food and may occasionally try to take on one. Sometimes it may fail, sometimes it can succeed as seen in those instances. And for how exceptional and rare it is to see a leopard, medium game specialist, to willingly attack and take down such large and powerful prey for its size is obviously fascinating, I would myself even be amazed to see that despite knowing they can do it. That's not how I see leopards, I know their habits, I also know their impressive limits, I love them and award them for this. I just get mad when I see around "but they can't kill this because it's too large and they are specialized to take mostly on small antelopes", while I agree on the last part I always get mad at the first line and say "but that's just wrong, I know it's rare because it's not their ideal prey as it's too large and dangerous but occasionally it can happen". This is also why I started this argument, this reason only.
Long story short this is my view on how these interactions work, and I think it's pretty much the same as what you would think.
Still got no answer on the lynx case, that wasn't an adult boar to my estimate, what does the source say? |
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Post by PumAcinonyx SuperCat on Aug 21, 2023 19:57:04 GMT
A brief history on my Internet name and Profile picture So, this is a response to grampa , and CoolJohnson (The name for grampa because he made reference to my name yesterday, and the profile picture for CoolJohnson). As you all know, I am a cat fan, (always have been, and always will be till the end of my days), and as such, it is only normal that I feel the inclination to incorporate the word "cat", or have the name of any cat species incorporated to what I will use as my online identity. Quora is the first animal community that I joined (then Discord, then Food Chain, then Bestiary in that order), and when I was about to become a poster, I had to think about what name I would use. Fortunately, it wasn't hard, because there was one that I had always had on my mind for some 5 or 6 years, at the time. In truth, the name "SuperCat" was not invented by me. As it turns out, there have been posters (or maybe just one poster) who also went by the name of "Super Cat" (I am aware that there is one such person on the old Carnivora Forum), and that's something that I wasn't aware of at the time I chose the name. I didn’t know that there had been other "Super Cats." The name that I use "The SuperCat" or "SuperCat" for short was actually something that was inspired by the 2013 (I think, at least that's what it says on YouTube) Nat Geo Wild documentary titled "Super Cat", a documentary that aimed at developing a fictional cat that had all the best abilities boasted by the cat family incorporated into one being, what they referred to as: "Super Cat." To expatiate, that would mean giving the fictional cat: the speed of the cheetah (as cheetahs are the fastest runner in the cat family), the jumping/acrobatic ability of the caracal (which is actually wrong, because cougars can jump higher and farther than caracals, so they should have used cougars instead, the best jumpers in the cat family. Don't know why, guess it wasn't my show), the climbing abilities of the margay (as they, alongside clouded leopards, and arguably marbled cats, are the best climbers in the cat family, able to rotate their ankles 180°, climb down trees headfirst, and climb upside down), the ears of the serval (because they have the biggest ears, and the biggest ears relative to body size in the cat family, able to rotate them 180° independently of each other, and detect ultrasonic sounds made by mice in the bush), the vision/visual prowess of a lynx (as lynxes are renowned for their remarkable vision, even though cats in general have very good and depth-perceptive night vision), the feet/webbing of a fishing cat (do I have to explain?), the coat/fur colour of a black panther (because they thought it would be best if "Super Cat" functioned in the night, under the cover of darkness), the ear tufts of a caracal (because it's believed that they help to amplify whatever the cat hears), the social structure/lifestyle of a lion (since team work multiplies strength, and makes lions even more deadly) the mane of a lion (to act as a shield in battle, or to just give it good ammo, or because it's already living like a lion, which is the actual reason), the bite of a tiger (because tigers have the strongest bite in the cat family), the roar of a tiger (which is just "what the hell is going on guys?" I thought it was common knowledge that lions had the loudest roar of all cats??? Why did you freakin use a tiger???), the body size of a cougar (because after all the mixing of the "ingredients" they thought the cougar would be the best size, as in body mass, that "Super Cat" should have, even though that came with its own compromise, as a cat the size of a cougar, cannot possibly run as fast as a cheetah, nor can it possess the strength of a tiger), and lastly, the street smarts of a domestic cat (because they wanted "Super Cat" to be able to move around human settlements, like feral cats do, except in the night, and feasting on, you know what? Human flesh). Overall, it's a great documentary, I highly recommend watching it.
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Post by PumAcinonyx SuperCat on Aug 21, 2023 20:01:38 GMT
I watched it in 2016/2017 (I think '16, but I'm not too sure), and ever since then, I just loved the idea of a "Super hero" cat that had all the best features of cats that we all know and love, all the best features that made cats the ultimate killing machines. I was really captivated by that documentary. So much so, that I kind of nicknamed myself "Super Cat". I think at a time, I even began stylishly writing "Super Cat" as my signature (not sure about that, but it's possible). And so, when I had to join an online platform, and think of what name I'd use, I didn't even have to think at all: it just came to my mind: "Super Cat." But "Super Cat" sounded kind of bland and unoriginal (as if I just copied Nat Geo Wild), so I decided to stylise it a bit. So, I joined "Super" and "Cat" together, removing the space between them, and added "The" to make it sound even cooler, to make it look like a name referring to just one individual. You know, if you write the name "SuperCat", that can be referring to many people. Super Cat? Which Super Cat? There can be many "SuperCats." But adding "The" to it made it sound more classy, as if it's just one person that it's referring to, like "The SuperCat." I decided to include "PumAcinonyx" in my name too, just so "The SuperCat" doesn't become too boring. It can sort of get dry if on every forum that you use, you have the same name. So, I thought, let me just edit it, while still retaining "SuperCat" in the name. So, I decided that on apps like Quora and Discord, I'll use "The SuperCat", but on forums which don't have an app, but are instead based on Chrome, I'll use "PumAcinonyx SuperCat." So, if hypothetically, I signed on to Reddit today, I would use "The SuperCat" because Reddit is an app. While if I signed in to a forum like Carnivora, or WildFact, or Domain of the bears, I would use "PumAcinonyx SuperCat", because they are platforms that don't have an app of their own, but are instead based on Chrome/Safari, or whatever Web browser you use. After deciding on the name I'd use to represent myself, I only thought it fit to use the picture of the animal I was naming myself after. So, I looked for the picture of Nat Geo Wild's "Super Cat" on the Internet, downloaded it, and began using it as my profile picture everywhere: whether forum or app. This is the picture itself:  And the link to the page where I found it: non-aliencreatures.fandom.com/wiki/Super_CatYou can see it in the documentary on YouTube at the 46:47 mark: |
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