![]() Michelle J Photography, Cooma, NSW., Author provided Under the scheme, about 4,600 “wild dog” body parts have reportedly been redeemed since 2011.Īlpine dingoes can be found at high elevations along eastern Australia. It pays landholders A$120 per wild dog body part. This year Victoria renewed its “wild dog bounty” program. Lethal control programs have been extended into conservation areas, including national parks, with the primary purpose of minimising livestock losses on neighbouring lands.ĭuring 2020-2021, NSW dropped more than 200,000 1080 poisoned meat-baits from planes and helicopters to suppress “wild dogs”. It is crucial that updated genetic surveys be carried out on dingoes, using the latest DNA methods to inform local dingo management plans.ĭingo conservation plans should consider the presence of geographic variation and the differing threats the four dingo populations may be facing.Ĭurrently, dingoes fall into a grey area: because they are both a native animal and agricultural pest and because their identity has become ambiguous due to the widespread adoption of the term wild dog. Wildlife managers and scientists should ensure that the DNA testing methods they use are accurate and fit for purpose. We need to ensure public policy is built on robust, up-to-date knowledge of dingo identity and ancestry. These findings have important implications for our knowledge of dingoes and how they are managed. Australian aerial baiting programs can kill up to 90% of the dingoes in an area, reducing the availability of mates for any remaining dingoes. ![]() One explanation is that lethal control programs carried out during the dingo breeding season may increase the risk of dingo-dog hybrids, as it does for wolves and coyotes in North America. In NSW, over 60% of the animals we tested were pure dingoes and only two animals had less than 70% dingo DNA.ĭog ancestry was more common in NSW and Queensland dingo populations where there were intensive lethal control programs, such as aerial 1080 poison baiting, along with higher numbers of pet domestic dogs. So when we looked at Victorian dingoes, nearly 90% of the animals we tested were pure dingoes. We found evidence of at least four populations or varieties of dingo in Australia, which we call: West, East, South and Big Desert.Ī map showing the distribution of the four wild dingo populations across Australia from Cairns et al. The older method was also unable to account for geographic variation in dingoes. In general, more DNA markers means more information about an individual and more accurate DNA test results. This is the same sort of technology used for human ancestry or family tree testing. We used 195,000 DNA markers.Ī DNA marker is a genetic change that can be used to study differences between species, populations or individuals. This is because the technique used a relatively small number of DNA markers, only 23. When we compared old and new DNA testing methods in our study, we found the original method frequently misidentified pure dingoes as hybrids. Similarly in NSW “predation and hybridisation by feral dogs ( Canis familiaris)” was listed as a key threatening process in 2009.īut DNA testing methods have improved since then. Scientific support for the idea that few pure dingoes remain in eastern Australia came from skull measurement tests developed in the 1980s and a DNA test developed in the 1990s.Īpplying these approaches, Victoria listed dingoes as a threatened species after finding just 1% of animals killed in pest control programs were pure dingoes. But while dingoes are genetically distinct from domestic dogs, they can breed with them. The dingo ( Canis dingo) has been in Australia for 5,000 to 11,000 years. Why dingoes should be considered native to mainland Australia – even though humans introduced them Chontelle Burns/Nouveau Rise Photography, CC BY A pure dingo from Myall Lakes walking on a sand dune.
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