Do lions eat elephants?

Yes, lions eat the occasional young elephant if the opportunity arises. There is no shortage of images of lions attacking young and even adult elephants on the internet. There are also photographs of adult elephants stomping on lions and killing them in defence. Lions are very adaptable in the size of their prey. They feed on any land mammal and sometimes fish and other aquatic animals. Hoofed animals are their principle prey.

Lion eyes up young elephant
Two useful tags. Click either to see the articles: Toxic to cats | Dangers to cats

Lion eyes up young elephant. Photo unattributed.

Where large grazing animals are available they’ll take them such as giraffes weighting 760 kilograms, hippos and buffalo weighing 500 kilograms.

However, lions also eat small prey animals such as birds, hares, ostrich eggs, porcupines, bat-eared foxes etc.. Lions are like the other big cats in their selection of prey. It is not a matter of choice but adapting to feed on what is available. Is it fair to say that the old adage, ‘beggars are not choosers’ is applicable? Well lions are far from being beggars but they are not picky in what they feed on.

Lions also scavenge. For example along Namibia’s Skeleton Coast lions scavenge on cormorant and seal carcasses. They also hunt for seals.

Useful links
Anxiety - reduce it
FULL Maine Coon guide - lots of pages
Children and cats - important

References:

About elephants: R.G. Ruggiero in Prey selection of the lion in the Manovo-Gouda-St.Floris National Park, Central African Republic.

General reference: Wild Cats of the World by Mel and Fiona Sunquist – please leave a comment if you’d like full references.

SOME MORE ON LION PREY:

Scavengers force lions to eat prey where they kill them

Do lions cover their kills?

G.B. Schaller in his book The Serengeti Lion (1972) examined several hundred lion kills and only on 13 occasions did ...
Read More
Lion pride

How long can lions go without water?

Lions normally drink water every day if it is available. When researchers have observed prides of lions in the Serengeti ...
Read More
Who wins in a hippopotamus versus lion fight?

Who wins a lion versus hippo fight?

There are no official figures regarding lion versus hippo fights. We have to go to the Internet for a gut ...
Read More
Lion kills zebra

How do lions kill their prey?

This post is specifically about the act of killing a prey animal. I am not going to discuss the predation ...
Read More
Lionesses attacking a giraffe

Do lions eat giraffes?

The question in the title is pretty well redundant today because you will see many videos on YouTube and on ...
Read More
Lion hunts camels

Do lions eat camels?

Yes, in India, Gir Forest Asiatic lions eat camels albeit relatively rarely. One point four percent (1.4%) of kills by ...
Read More
Lion eating fish

Do lions eat fish?

Yes, lions will eat fish. Lions have been recorded feeding on almost anything and everything, mostly land mammals but also ...
Read More
Jaguar catching a fish

Which big cats eat fish?

Which big cats eat fish? The big cats are the tiger, lion, jaguar and leopard. They will all eat fish ...
Read More
Useful tag. Click to see the articles: Cat behavior

Note: sources for news articles are carefully selected but the news is often not independently verified.

Michael Broad

Hi, I'm a 74-year-old retired solicitor (attorney in the US). Before qualifying I worked in many jobs including professional photography. I love nature, cats and all animals. I am concerned about their welfare. If you want to read more click here.

You may also like...

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *