Painted Dog | National Geographic

you’re invited to a coming-out party
here in the Okavango Delta in Botswana
Africa three weeks ago these wild
painted dog mothers gave birth to a
perky pile of pups the pups are ready to
leave the Burrow and join the pack until
now
the mothers hadn’t let anyone near the
pups but now the whole pack can welcome
the new arrivals this is when the social
structure shifts into an extreme
matriarchy not only is the dominant
female in charge in general she now also
takes charge of all the pups of all the
mothers in fact the dominant mother is
the only one allowed to nurse all the
cups of all the females who gave birth
in this case that’s 21 hungry mouths
this doesn’t sit so well with the other
mothers to be shut out this early and
this completely no more nuzzling no more
licking their wounds ha ha I don’t think
so one of the disgruntled moms decides
to take matters into her own mouth she
kidnaps a puffer and absconds women she
in the cohort carry it back to another
borough of course the dominant female
wouldn’t be the dominant female if she
let pack members get away with
shenanigans like this she drives off
these rabble-rousers and then three
kidnaps the errant what a woman
bold as an action hero while nursing
this and twenty other cups this has
gotta be your mother of the year