Lion pride size versus feeding group size

The attached dataset provides a sampled distribution of 3230 feeding groups of adult female lions in relation to size of the pride that those females belonged to in Serengeti National park, Tanzania. Ecological theory suggests that large social groups of carnivores should have reduced foraging efficiency because they encounter prey no more frequently than solitary hunters, but the entire group must share any prey they encounter. We developed behaviorally-based foraging models to show that fragmentation of large social groups into smaller hunting subgroups or mutual cooperation during hunting are both plausible hypothetical mechanisms capable of sustaining larger lion prides. The attached dataset from the Serengeti ecosystem demonstrates that lion prides typically fragment into small hunting groups that are well approximated by an exponential distribution of group sizes typical of fission-fusion social systems. A model linking fission-fusion group dynamics with predator-prey interaction predicts both the surprising degree of population stability of the Serengeti lions as well as the long-term persistence of large prides. There is little evidence, however, that Serengeti lions cooperate during hunting except when they hunt Cape buffalo, so fission-fusion is apparently the dominant stabilizing process in Serengeti.

Methods
Lion social groups were sampled by vehicle every day by traversing the Serengeti National Park and from VHS radio-collar signals. If the group was feeding, the number of adult females in the group was noted, as well as the total number of adult females in the pride that the feeding group belonged to.