Our research team excavates an ancient hyena den, which collapsed nearly one million years ago, trapping, and then preserving the occupants. At the center of the photograph is a complete hyena skeleton (you can see the shoulder blade and spine of one individual at the bottom of the photograph). One of the goals of the Olorgesailie research is to paint an accurate picture of the habitat inhabited by our early human ancestors at Olorgesailie. Hyenas are one of the major predators in the savanna and grasslands of Africa today, and they would have been in competition with early human occupants of the Olorgesailie Basin for limited meat resources. Exactly what were these competitive relationships? Were the early humans of Olorgesailie hunters? Or were they scavengers, making their living by finding carcasses before other animals?