With some scientific background in the wildlife field, I often try to stay up to date with new scientific findings. A recent study titled “All in the Details: A First Assessment for the Viability of Metabarcoding in Diet Composition Analysis of African Wild Dogs” caught my attention. I thought it would make a great topic to write about.
When it comes to understanding African wild dogs, one of the continent’s most endangered carnivores, every detail matters. Their movements, pack structure, denning behaviour, and diet all play a huge role in their survival. Until now, figuring out what wild dogs eat has relied on an old-school method: searching through their scat (faeces) for hair, hooves, bones, or other identifiable leftovers. But what about prey animals that leave no hard parts behind? Or meals digested so thoroughly that nothing recognisable remains?
This study steps into that gap with a modern tool: metabarcoding, which could reshape the way we understand these extraordinary predators.
Here’s a brief explanation of metabarcoding: it is essentially forensic science for analysing wildlife diets. Instead of looking for physical remains, scientists analyse tiny DNA fragments found in scat. Every animal a wild dog eats leaves behind genetic traces. With specific laboratory techniques, researchers can match these DNA fragments to the prey species the wild dogs have consumed.
The findings in the paper were quite different from what we’d normally expect from observations and the old-school method. Alongside the expected impala and other antelope species, the study picked up the genetic signatures of smaller prey: warthog piglets, hares or scrub hares, rodents and birds (specifically- Cape hare, vlei rat, and two francolin species). These species rarely appear in observational records or traditional scat studies because their bones are soft and digestible, their feathers or fur are easily lost, and they are often consumed quickly during opportunistic kills.
For wild dogs, these findings are important because they show the animals may rely on a more diverse prey base than previously assumed. Understanding these “hidden” prey species is crucial, as it reveals a more complete picture of wild dog dietary flexibility, how they adapt to prey availability, and how they may respond to environmental shifts or prey declines.
For me personally, these findings are fascinating and make me pay closer attention to what wild dogs get up to behind the scenes. Just the other day, I witnessed a wild dog feeding on a dung beetle. The study also detected traces of elephant and hyena DNA in wild dog scat, which I could hardly believe, since wild dogs don’t eat these animals. Maybe the DNA likely came from dung beetles that had fed on elephant dung, or from wild dogs rolling in hyena scat to mask their scent. Although these unusual DNA traces don’t represent major dietary contributions, the smaller prey species highlighted in the study do play a role in wild dog survival.
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