Dingoes are a well known Australian dog, frequently spotted on Australian adventure trips The dingo is thought to have evolved from the Iranian wolf Canis lupus pallipes, transported to Australia by Asian seafarers around 4000 years ago. Today, dingoes are found in most parts of mainland Australia, and are generally accepted as a native species. Many Australian adventures occur searching for this species.
A pure-bred adult dingo is naturally lean, standing approximately 60cm high and weighing about 15kg. They are commonly sandy-yellow in colour, although some dingoes are ginger, black and tan or even white.
Dingoes are hunters and scavengers, eating anything from berries to buffalo. They generally specialise in the most common wildlife prey in the area and change their hunting strategy accordingly. For example, dingoes will form packs to hunt more agile species like kangaroos, while solitary dingoes have more luck hunting rabbits and small prey.
Dingoes have also been known to harass sheep and cattle, but most attacks occur when native prey is scarce due to drought or habitat destruction. Dingoes will also scavenge on carcasses of livestock, contributing to misunderstandings about their hunting habits.
From harsh deserts to lush rainforests, the highly adaptable dingo is found in nearly every habitat, favouring the edges of forests bordering grasslands. Dingoes live for around 10 years in the wild and can breed from the age of one or two. Unlike the domestic dog, the dingo breeds gives birth only once a year to litters of around five pups.
One of the biggest threats to the dingo as a species is the inception of the ‘wild dog’— a cross breed between dingoes and domestic or feral dogs. Fraser Island is thought to have one of the purest remaining dingo populations. Due to the island’s size and isolation preventing inbreeding and crossbreeding, scientists believe it may be the only place capable of protecting dingoes from extinction.
Both dingoes and wild dogs play an important role as natural predators in healthy ecosystems, and have been attributed with keeping fox and feral cat populations in check.
