A mammal of rocky habitats in Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. It shelters in crevices and eats grasses and leaves.
It has a stocky body and a very short tail. Large pads on the soles are moistened by sweat, helping it grip rocks.
Male rock hyraxes build long songs from repeated short sounds. Each bout often begins with a long element called a wail, averaging about 0.6 seconds, followed by shorter chucks. In recordings at Ein Gedi Nature Reserve in Israel, wails began about 87% of song bouts, and both their occurrence and duration declined as a song progressed.
In field playback experiments in 2020–2021, researchers played male songs 118 times and recorded whether another male replied by singing. Forty trials used natural songs, 39 used songs with about 70% of the wails removed, and 39 used songs with wails cut into short segments separated by gaps. Natural songs drew more singing replies than songs with reduced wails, and replies to songs with interrupted wails took longer than replies to natural songs. The researchers suggest that the opening wail helps capture listeners' attention so the rest of a song can reach them.
IUCN Red List · Least Concern (LC) · Global
The IUCN's 2015 global assessment classified the rock hyrax as Least Concern (LC), and the current ASM Mammal Diversity Database record also lists its IUCN status as LC.