When it comes to spotted hyaenas, opinions are strongly divided. While some consider them to be lowly scavengers only good enough to steal food from the mighty lions, a growing number of us recognise these hyaenas for what they really are: one of the most interesting and exciting top predator species to study! Affectionately known as "spotties", these powerful carnivores are more than capable of hunting for themselves and sometimes lions will actually steal or scavenge from the kills they make. Like lions, spotties are highly social animals, yet their society operates entirely differently to the big cats, making them an especially interesting subject of research. One intriguing feature of the spotties' society is that although they live in large social groups, all clan members are rarely, if ever, seen together. Spotties forage alone or in sub-groups that frequently change composition, as clan members seem to change their minds about who they like to hang out with from one week to the next. This makes estimating population density and clan size quite tricky, yet we set out to tackle this task within the Ongava Reserve on the border of Etosha National Park. We deployed motion- and heat-sensitive camera traps for an extended period at waterholes on the reserve that would photograph hyaenas as they came to drink. Luckily for us, it is possible to identify individual hyaenas based on their unique coat markings, so we could use the photos to count every individual and determine association patterns between clan members.