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Comment by benjohnson | Hacker News Reader

Weird bit: Hyenas are genetically felines, but behave more like dogs than the cats we're used to.

Hyenas are inverse foxes. Hyenas are dog software on cat hardware and foxes are cat software on dog hardware.

Yes, and weirdly, hyenas didn't get the sharp, retractable claws that all true cats possess. I wonder what advantage this adaptation gave them.

You can probably keep retractable claws sharper? Easier too sneack without hard claws touching ground?

They couldn't kill each other easier?

Retractable claws stay sharper and make better weapons. The non-retractable kind give you better traction when running.

well, except for the whole "run up a tree" bit. :)

For what it's worth, foxes are much closer to dogs and wolves (and other canids) than hyenas are to cats.

The relationship between cats and hyenas is more like the relationship between dogs and bears, raccoons, or seals, which are classified as caniforms but are obviously distinct from actual canid species.

Hyenas aren't genetically feline, they are "genetically" feliform.

Felines are part of the Felidae family

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felidae

Hyenas are part of the Hyaenidae family

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyena

Both felines and hyenas are of the Feliformia order and they share a common ancestor but that doesn't mean hyenas are felines. Hyenas are more closely related to felines than dogs, but hyenas are not felines.

> Hyenas are genetically felines

Huh, I didn't know that, I'd always seen hyenas as cousins of dogs/wolves.

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