Australian Dingo - photos

Dingo

Dingo

Dingo

Dingo

About Australian Dingo

The Australian Dingo is an ancient wild dog endemic to Australia. It was thought to have arrived with people from Indonesia about 5000 years ago, when dogs were still considered undomesticated. Since that time and due to isolation, the breed had no interaction with other dog types and is now thought to be the oldest dog breed in the world. Since European colonisation, cross-breeding with domesticated dogs is threatening their purity, but there are still a reasonable number of pure breeds in existence.

Dingoes are resourceful creatures and have adapted well to a Australia's different and often challenging ecosystems. They hunt in packs and use tactics like using a lead dog to chase an animals toward the rest of the pack. They have even been known to fish for food.

Farmers consider Dingoes as pests because they attack sheep and other livestock. The world'slongest fence, the Dingo Fence was erected in Australia during the 1880s to stop dingoes from entering the fertile south-east part of the continent where sheep graze. This fence is still in use and is the world'slongest at 5,614 km (3,488 mi).

Dingos have been known to attack and kill humans. One report that gained world wide attention and was subsequently made into a movie, happened in 1980. A nine week old baby named Azaria Chamberlain, was taken by a dingo from a camp site at Uluru (Ayers Rock). Her parents were convicted of murder, but a crucial piece of evidence, the babies jacket, was found in a dingo den four years later, resulting in the parents being exonerated.