To call wild dogs "efficient" hunters is to deny the savagery of the typical hunting scene as a pack of the brindled beasts, black, gold, and white, lean and long-legged, with round ears over dark eyes and bared teeth, attacks a gazelle. The dogs run their prey to exhaustion while making sounds like distant bells or bird calls. At the end of the chase, one wild dog grabs the gazelle by the upper lip, and another bites its tail. The rest of the dogs, which may comprise as few as two or as many as thirty, go for the guts. Wild dogs disembowel their prey, usually killing it in three to five minutes.

Efficient or not, their numbers are shrinking. Worldwide, the African wild dog, also known as the Cape hunting dog or Lycaon pictus, is estimated to number fewer than 4000 and is listed as an endangered species. The largest population in Africa lives on the Selous Game Reserve, although the canids can survive anywhere from the arid Sahara to the snowy heights of Mount Kilimanjaro. Diurnal and fast-moving, traveling up to 25 miles per day when game is scarce, they are sometimes seen in the Serengeti and Mikumi national parks of Tanzania as well as in other parts of southern and eastern Africa. They are in danger of extinction because they are susceptible to distemper and rabies, and because they are hated by farmers.

The social behavior of African wild dogs has fascinated such observers as Jane Goodall, Hugo von Lawick and Richard Estes. Males stay with their natal packs throughout the ten years of an average life span, while females who have reached maturity migrate, often as a group of sisters, to a new pack. A highly unusual feature of African wild dogs is the preponderance of males. Estes has documented two or three males for every female in adult populations.

Dominance hierarchies among wild dogs are not always clearly evident. Wild dogs tend to be friendly and co-operative. Even in apparently non-hierarchical packs, however, a strict division of labor assigns some males and females to guard the den and the young, while others lead the hunt. The old and young feed first at the end of a successful hunt. Begging for food is common, and wild dogs generally get what they want by acting small and submissive. A submissive dog turns its head aside and presents the nape of its neck to the dominant animal.

Wild dogs can be quite solicitous of old or infirm members. Mary Lang Edwards, a biologist who took a Thomson safari in 2000, said that in the Selous Game Reserve she saw a female wild dog with a gaping wound surrounded by a group of females. "They stayed with her, obviously very concerned," Edwards said.

Observers have found in some packs an organization like that of wolves, with one alpha male and one alpha female presiding. The alphas distinguish themselves by cocking one hind leg while urinating, a behavior other wild dogs do not imitate. In these packs, both males and females raise the litter of the alpha female. Pups born to another female may be brutally killed, usually in a struggle between the mother and the alpha female reminiscent of the biblical King Solomon's challenge to two women who claimed the same baby.

Wild dogs typically feed on impala, gazelle, wildebeest and smaller game. Their rate of success killing such animals is extremely high, about 85 percent. Zebra are a different story. When a pack of dog approaches a herd of zebra, the zebra stallion trots away from his mares and foals and charges the dogs with head lowered, nostrils flared and teeth exposed. If the dogs do not immediately flee, he kicks them with his sharp hooves and powerful hind legs. Only a small minority of dog packs can overwhelm a zebra. Interestingly, even a smaller minority will try. Behavioral scientist James Malcolm, who has observed dogs and zebras in the wild, theorizes that zebra hunting may be a learned behavior passed through generations of males, the constants in a pack, along with knowledge about the locations of water sources, range boundaries, and concentrations of prey.

Wild dogs find their prey by sight, not smell. They are also distinguished from other canids by having only four toes on their front paws. They tend to occupy dens originally made by other animals, such as warthogs, and they know how to conserve energy when game is plentiful. If one pack member gets the urge to hunt, it encourages the others by licking their faces, and jumping about. The others may get up and begin the chase, but end it abruptly if the prey gets too far away. It is simply too much trouble to pursue distant prey when the alternative is to lie around the den.