50 Fun Facts About African Animals

Which African big cat, the fastest animal on land, has claws that it can only partly retract?

Cheetahs can run at 93 to 104 km/h. The dark tear streaks that run from the corners of their eyes down to the mouth are found on no other cat.

Despite looking like giant pigs, hippos have which sea mammals as their closest living relatives?

Whales, dolphins and porpoises share an ancestor with hippos; the two lines split about 55 million years ago. The likeness to pigs is only skin deep.

Which flightless African bird, the largest alive, sprints on feet that have just two toes each?

Ostrich feet have two toes where most birds have four, and the nail on the larger toe resembles a hoof. A sprinting bird can exceed 70 km/h.

Which collective noun names a group of giraffes, whose males duel by swinging their necks?

Tower is the word, apt for the tallest of all land animals. A necking duel between two well-matched males can go on for more than half an hour.

Simba, the hero's name in Disney's The Lion King, is the word for 'lion' in which language?

Swahili, spoken widely across East Africa, supplied other names in the film as well: Rafiki, for one, means 'friend'.

Rhino horn, poached for traditional medicine, is made of which protein also found in fingernails?

Keratin also builds hair and hooves, and there is no good evidence that the horn has any health benefit. Taking it has been likened to swallowing fingernail clippings.

Which group of primates, with around 100 living species, is native only to the island of Madagascar?

Lemurs evolved in isolation on Madagascar. More than a dozen giant kinds died out after people reached the island about 2,000 years ago.

Which snake, Africa's longest venomous species, is named for the colour inside its mouth?

Black mamba skin is usually olive, khaki or yellowish-brown. The snake gapes to flash its dark mouth lining as a warning when it feels threatened.

Africa's only native penguin is nicknamed the 'jackass penguin' because of which trait?

Its donkey-like bray rings out over colonies such as Boulders Beach near Cape Town. Penguins settled that mainland beach only in the 1980s.

Which African primate, the largest alive, lives in troops led by an adult male called a silverback?

Gorilla males earn the name from the silver hair that covers the backs of adults. A silverback will defend his troop against leopards even at the cost of his own life.

Which antelope, also called the gnu, treks in huge herds on East Africa's annual Great Migration?

Wildebeest herds time the trek to follow the rains and the fresh grass that comes after. A group of them has a fitting collective noun: a confusion.

Which small southern African mongoose is immune to scorpion venom and posts sentries as it forages?

Meerkats live in mobs that will fiercely attack snakes that come too near. Timon, the wisecracking sidekick in The Lion King, is one.

Which burrowing, termite-eating African mammal has a name that means 'earth pig' in Afrikaans?

Aardvarks are no relation of the pig, whatever the name says. The species is the only living member of its entire order of mammals, the Tubulidentata.

Which African predator, known for its laugh-like calls, lives in clans where females outrank males?

Spotted hyena females are larger than the males and dominate them. Far from being mere scavengers, the clans get most of their food by hunting.

An elephant's tusks are greatly enlarged versions of which teeth, rooted in the upper jaw?

Incisors, the second pair in the upper jaw, grow into the tusks. They are living tissue and fairly soft, and in African elephants both sexes carry them.

A zebra's skin is black beneath its coat; most evidence suggests the stripes evolved to deter what?

Biting flies struggle to land on stripes. In one 2019 study they failed to touch down even on horses dressed in zebra-print coats.

Which African pig, the species of Pumbaa in The Lion King, enters its burrow backwards?

Warthogs often feed kneeling, shuffling about on their wrists. The 'warts' of the name are really facial wattles, most distinct in males.

Which leaping antelope is South Africa's national animal and the nickname of its rugby union team?

Springbok comes from the Afrikaans words for 'jump' and 'buck'. The animals pronk, bouncing stiff-legged as high as 2 m into the air.

Which Congo forest animal with zebra-striped legs is the giraffe's only living relative?

Okapi tracks puzzled the explorer Harry Johnston, who had expected some kind of forest horse. A skull he obtained showed in 1901 that it was kin to the giraffe.

Which British primatologist showed at Tanzania's Gombe that chimpanzees make and use tools?

Jane Goodall watched a chimp push grass stalks into a termite mound and pull them out coated in insects, upending the belief that only humans used tools.

Which endangered canine, the largest in Africa, lives in packs and is also called the painted wolf?

African wild dog packs wear the blotchy coats behind the species name pictus, Latin for 'painted'. The animal has been listed as endangered since 1990.

Which scaly, ant-eating mammal of Africa and Asia is the most trafficked mammal in the world?

Pangolins curl into a tight ball when threatened, tucking the face under the tail. Poachers take them for their meat and for scales used in traditional medicine.

Which reptile, Africa's largest predator, has hatchlings whose sex is set by the nest's temperature?

Nile crocodile hatchlings turn out male or female depending on the heat of the nest in the middle third of incubation, not on their genes. Adults are the second-largest reptiles alive.

Which long-legged African bird of prey catches victims on the ground and often stomps them to death?

Secretarybirds may owe their name to the quill-like feathers at the top of the neck, which reminded one naturalist of a scribe with a pen tucked behind his ear.

Which African insect was the first animal shown to steer by the glow of the Milky Way at night?

Dung beetles of a nocturnal African species hold their course by the galaxy's band of light. Ancient Egyptians saw a god in the ball-rolling insect: Khepri, pushing the sun across the sky.

Africa's 'Big Five' (lion, leopard, rhino, elephant and buffalo) were first grouped for what reason?

Hardest to hunt on foot was the test, and the list dates from colonial times. Size was never the point: the giraffe and the hippo both outweigh a leopard but are left out.

About half of all species of which lizards, famed for projectile tongues, live only on Madagascar?

Chameleons number about 200 species, nearly all of them African. Tree-dwelling kinds grip with a prehensile tail so handy that it is often called a fifth limb.

Hippos ooze a red skin fluid nicknamed 'blood sweat'; what job does it do?

Acts as a sunscreen is right: its pigments absorb ultraviolet light and also slow the growth of bacteria. The fluid is neither blood nor sweat.

Which birds nest on Tanzania's Lake Natron, whose caustic water keeps predators away?

Lesser flamingos across East Africa depend on Natron as their only regular breeding site in the region. Pigments in the algae they eat give the birds their pink colour.

Which African bird rides on rhinos, zebras and giraffes, picking ticks from their hides?

Oxpeckers are not pure helpers: they also drink blood from wounds on their hosts' backs. In East Africa one kind is known as 'the rhino's guard'.

Which marmot-like African mammal, the dassie, is a closer relative of elephants than of rodents?

Hyraxes even grow a small pair of tusks, as elephants do. Both belong to one branch of mammals along with manatees and dugongs.

Which ape, the sister species of the chimpanzee, lives only in the Democratic Republic of the Congo?

Bonobos are cut off from chimpanzees by the Congo River, since neither is a good swimmer. Unusually for apes, their groups are typically led by an old, experienced female.

Which African primate, the largest of all monkeys, has vivid red and blue skin on its face?

Mandrill hordes in Gabon can top 600 animals, possibly the largest stable groups of any primate. Rafiki in The Lion King is drawn as one, with an oddly long tail.

Which fearless African carnivore, also called the ratel, can twist freely inside its loose skin?

Honey badgers have few natural predators thanks to that thick hide, their strength and a ferocious defence. Cobras are a regular part of their diet.

Which collective noun can name a group of zebras, whose stripe patterns are unique to each animal?

Dazzle is one name for the herd, and zeal is another. Plains zebras live in stable family harems of one stallion, several mares and their foals.

The white rhino grazes and the black rhino browses; their alternative names describe which feature?

Shape of the lip sets them apart: the 'square-lipped' white rhino has a broad mouth for cropping grass, while the 'hook-lipped' black has a pointed upper lip that grasps leaves and twigs.

Which North African desert animal, the smallest fox species, sheds heat through its huge ears?

Fennec foxes use those ears twice over: to dump heat and to listen for prey moving under the sand. Their kidneys are adapted to get by on very little water.

Which red-tailed bird of equatorial Africa is prized as a pet for mimicking human speech?

Grey parrots can do more than copy sounds: one named Alex learned over 100 words and could tell objects apart by colour and material.

Which burrowing rodent of the Horn of Africa lives in insect-like colonies with one breeding queen?

Naked mole-rats can live beyond 37 years, longer than any other rodent. They also feel no pain from acid and are remarkably resistant to cancer.

Which blood-feeding African insect spreads sleeping sickness to people and nagana to cattle?

Tsetse fly males and females both live on blood, and one can take a meal equal to its own body weight.

Which fish, thought extinct since the age of the dinosaurs, was caught alive off South Africa?

Coelacanths were known only from fossils until a museum curator, Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer, noticed one in a local fisherman's catch. The living genus, Latimeria, is named after her.

Which wading bird of East African swamps, once classed as a stork, is named for its huge bill?

Shoebills are now grouped with the pelicans and herons on genetic evidence, and their closest relative is the hamerkop. They range through swamps from South Sudan down to Zambia.

Which amphibian of Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea, the largest of its kind, can weigh over 3 kg?

Goliath frog tadpoles start out no bigger than those of ordinary species. The heaviest adult on record, caught in 1960, weighed 3.3 kg.

Which grass-eating monkey with a bare red chest patch lives only in the highlands of Ethiopia?

Geladas are sometimes called bleeding-heart monkeys because of that chest patch. Grass makes up as much as 90% of what they eat.

Which South African zebra, striped only on its front half, was hunted to extinction in the 1800s?

Quaggas vanished when the last captive animal died in Amsterdam in 1883. A century later theirs became the first DNA from an extinct animal ever to be analysed.

What name is given to the skin-covered bony knobs on a giraffe's head, swung as clubs in fights?

Ossicones differ from horns and antlers in keeping a permanent covering of skin and fur. Both male and female giraffes grow a pair.

What are the ring-like clusters of spots on a leopard's coat called, unique to each cat?

Rosettes help a leopard melt into cover as it stalks and ambushes prey, which it sometimes drags up a tree afterwards.

Which African fish can survive for months out of water, buried in the mud of a dry stream bed?

Lungfish of four species live in Africa's swamps and marshes. They show how the shift from breathing water to breathing air can come about.

Which southern African bird builds one giant shared nest that can house over 100 pairs?

Sociable weaver nests are among the largest built by any bird and hold several generations at once. Inside, the chambers stay at a kinder temperature than the air outside.

Which ox-sized, spiral-horned antelope has been domesticated in southern Africa for its meat?

Eland can still leap 2.5 m from a standing start despite their bulk. Herds give themselves away with a loud clicking, thought to come from their hooves.