THE HYENA AND THE HUNTING DOG 255 



by various expeditions on the Loita Plains, the Kedong 

 Valley south of Lake Naivasha, and at Voi. 



The highland race of the striped hyena shows a grayer 

 coloration and more distinctly striped coat than the desert 

 race. The ground-color is pale-buff without any pinkish 

 suffusion, the stripes are quite blackish, the feet are uni- 

 form dusky-drab, and the dorsal mane is tipped by black. 

 The body size is somewhat larger than the other equatorial 

 races. An adult female of this race secured on the Loita 

 Plains by the Roosevelt Expedition and now in the National 

 Museum had the following flesh measurements: head and 

 body, 43 inches; tail, ii^ inches; hind foot, 8>^ inches; 

 ear, 6 inches. Greatest length of skull, 9^ inches. 



Desert Striped Hyena 

 Hycena hycena bergeri 



Native Names: Somali, whera or didar. 



Hycena hienomelas bergeri Matschie, 1910, Sitz.-Ber. Ges. Nat. Freunde, 

 Bed., p. 361. 



Range. — Desert region of British East Africa from the 

 southern slopes of Mount Kenia and the Mau Escarpment 

 northward throughout the Lake Rudolf basin, southern 

 Abyssinia, and Somaliland. 



A specimen of the striped hyena from the Elgeyo 

 Escarpment in the Uasin Gishu Plateau region has been 

 made the type of the desert race by Matschie. The race has 

 been named for its collector. Doctor Berger, who has given 

 us **In Afrikas Wildkammern," an excellently illustrated 

 account of his hunting expedition through East Africa and 

 Uganda. The desert race may be distinguished from the 

 highland race by its pale-pinkish ground-color, less con- 

 spicuous stripes, brownish tips to the dorsal mane, light- 

 colored buff feet, with little or no dusky-brown mixture, 

 and smaller body size. Considerable individual variation 

 in color is shown by a series of skins from the Northern 

 Guaso Nyiro River in which the feet vary from pale-buff to 

 wood-brown and the hair tips of the dorsal crest from dusky- 

 brown to seal-brown or blackish. The dorsal stripes also 

 vary in intensity, but they are never as heavy or black as 



