Watching a big cat hunt is one of the most thrilling episodes of all time. How these predators silently hide behind bushes, with bent limbs and gleaming eyes, only to pound and hunt their prey with utmost courage and precision.Sometimes videos of these hunting stints go viral online, being shared by forest officials or wildlife photographersOne such video has gone viral yet again, but to the audience’s surprise, it is not what people would usually expect out of a big cat hunting down its favourite meal, and that is what is making users crazy.
Photo: @paragenetics/ X
Jaguar remains submerged in water to hunt down its prey
The clip shows a jaguar submerging for roughly 34 seconds to hunt a caiman entirely underwater, a hunting method most people wouldn’t associate with a big cat at all.The video was shared by Dr. PM Dhakate, Chief Conservator of Forests and Special Secretary to the Chief Minister on Panchayati Raj and Minority Welfare in the Government of Uttarakhand, on his X account, where he regularly posts wildlife videos and behavioural information about different animals.
Why does this hunt look so different from other big cats
According to Dhakate’s post, while other large felines depend on suffocating throat bites, jaguars use immense biting force to pierce the reptile’s skull directly. A caiman doesn’t have a distinguishable throat to clamp onto the way a deer or wildebeest does, and its armoured hide makes a suffocation hold largely pointless anyway. According to Panthera.org, the conservation organisation that studies jaguars in Brazil’s Pantanal, the cats’ powerful jaws allow them to pierce the skulls of their prey with relative ease. Jaguars use this technique specifically for tackling hard-to-kill, armoured species.
The jaguar got this behaviour from his mother
What makes this hunting style even more interesting is where it comes from. Dhakate’s post explains that this unique hunting strategy is a combination of evolved skull structure with learned behaviour passed down from mother to cub, adding that it is “not just instinct.”Cubs, are born with the physical tools for this kind of kill, but they still have to be shown how to use them properly by watching their mothers hunt.Dhakate further adds that this process ensures future generations possess the exact physical mechanics required to dominate the South American Pantanal wetland ecosystem and the skill itself is a survival tool passed through generations.