"In the end we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand. We will understand only what we have been taught." - Baba Dioum-African Ecologist.

The Australian Dingo Conservation Association is not merely about saving individual dingoes. Our mission is to save the species Canis lupus dingo from extinction. After 5000 years on the Australian continent the dingo has evolved with a very specialized social structure. Since the coming of the white man this structure has been severely disrupted by swamping the gene pool with domestic dogs and the eradication regimes such as baiting, shooting, trapping and habitat loss which are continuing to be conducted across the landscape. The Australian Dingo Conservation Association recognizes that keeping dingoes in captivity will over time cause the inherent genetic traits for dingoes to survive in specialized ecological groups to be lost.   It is not ideal for the animal but at the present time there is no alternative as there is no safe place for dingoes to habituate on the Australian landscape.

Latest research on wild populations has resulted in finding only scattered individual pure dingoes remaining in hybridized packs. Entire pure colonies of animals are non existent or extremely rare. 90% of wild dogs today are not pure dingoes. They are crossbred with domestic breeds.

DNA testing on upwards of 3000 samples shows that the percentage of pure animals is critically low. Once numbers of a species fall below 500 that species is then deemed to be endangered. We have a ridiculous situation within the Governments of Australia. The Federal government deems the Australian dingo as Native fauna and it is protected in all National Parks, however the various states and territories all have differing regulation on dingoes. On one landscape it is protected eg., in the ACT, whilst in most others it is classed as "vermin" eg. In Western Australia and Queensland - where government employees actually boast that their efforts have resulted in total extermination.

Large Hybrid dogs weighing approx. 40 to 50 kgs. twice the size of an average dingo

To change the official status of the dingo this out of date legislation must be unravelled. Those who make the legislation must be made to see the reality of the ecological disaster that extermination has inflicted on the native fauna of Australia. Since the beginning of European settlement and the commencement of farming activities no thought has been given to Australia's top order predator, other than to exterminate it. The Dingo is to Australia, what the Lion is to Africa and the Tiger is to India. In the absence of the dingo, true pest animals, introduced by the same people who conveniently outlawed and persecuted the dingo have taken hold with disastrous results. Feral dogs, rabbits, foxes, feral pigs cats and goats now run unabated over our fragile landscape. The proliferation of these animals has caused the extinction of 10% of mammal fauna in just 150 years (Hennessy1995) this is continuing.. That is a shameful world record. For five thousand years these animals lived in balanced harmony with the dingo.

Two hundred years of extermination practices have seen the total degradation of the ecosystems which existed harmoniously before European settlement.

The powerful farm lobby and politicians of Australia got it horribly wrong. It prevails today, steadfastly refusing to open its eyes to the total degradation of the unique and fragile balance of nature which its practices and laws have brought about. It is too late for the many species now extinct, the land suffocating in salinity. The most resilient Aussie battler of them all, the dingo, is walking in the shadow of death, and with it all the species which rely on it for survival, unless our cries of alarm are heard in those corridors of nature-ignorant law makers and politicians.

The future of the pure dingo in its primitive form is critical, and populations of dingoes are rapidly diminishing in all habitats across the continent. The desperate plight of the Australian dingo parallels the near extinction of the Northern hemisphere gray wolf and the rare Ethiopian wolf. The same influences have been brought to bear on our dingo. The Politicians of this country have failed to act to protect the dingo, have failed to appreciate the value of the animal as a top order predator essential to the biodiversity of the Australian landscape, the farming lobby have exerted enormous pressure on governments to eradicate the dingo over two hundred years.

The community at large is apathetic and due to constant sensationalist and many times negative media treatment, is often antagonistic towards the dingo. The farmer always blames the dingo when stock predation occurs when often the culprit is a feral dog, or dogs with collars. Hence the trapping, shooting , baiting programs continue, along with the insidiousness of hybridization, plus another serious parasitic disease, hydatid tapeworm which has infected it's food chain. This too has been introduced by the pastoral industry.

The Australian Dingo Conservation Association has had the foresight to commence a captive breeding program for the pure dingo. After seven years of DNA research we now have 130 DNA tested positive dingoes on our conservation register although approx. 300 animals are held in captive colonies across Australia. The conservation value of these captive pure dingoes is immeasurable. Some of these animals are the last remaining remnant population of the magnificent eastern Australian mountain dingoes now believed to be extinct in the wild by CSIRO scientists.

The ADCA is managing the conservation breeding program for dingoes and the Australian Species Management Program for Dingoes which was handed over to us by the Australasian Regional Association of Zoological Parks and Aquaria - courtesy of Healesville Sanctuary, Victoria.

All this is managed by ADCA members without funding support.

"The Destruction of one species is the destruction of knowledge. It means the final loss for the world of a unique part of the pool of genes- the units of inheritance- and this is something that can never be recovered".
(Professor John Turner. "Great Extermination" 1968)

Large spacious compounds for housing captive colonies of dingoes

Classification: Kingdom: Phylum: Class: Order: Family: Genus: Species: Subspecies:

Animalia Chordata Mammalia Carnivora Canidae Canis lupus dingo

The current recommended scientific name of the dingo is Canis lupus dingo. Habitat: Various, ranging from tropical coastal beaches, inland deserts or alpine forest. Activity pattern: Diurnal, crepuscular, in warmer climates nocturnal. Diet: The Dingoes diet will vary depending on habitat. Opportunistic hunter and scavenger, feeding on a range of food including invertebrates, reptiles, birds and both small and large mammals. Will also eat carrion. Height: 52-60cm Weight: 13-19Kg Coat colour:The color of the Dingo is ginger, ranging from sandy yellow to red ginger, pale cream and black and tan. All colour types show lighter shades on the throat, inside leg, on under belly and under tail. Black and tan dingoes have points varying from tan to cream on feet, pasterns inside legs, chest, throat, cheeks, eyebrows and vent. All colours will often have white markings restricted to the feet, chest spot, underside of neck, underbelly and tail tip. Social behaviour: Dingoes may live in family packs; an alpha breeding pair and their offspring of current and past years; adolescent or old adults ousted from the family group may form loose groups. Breeding season: March - June Gestation period: 63 days Litter size: 3-5 pups Sexual maturity: Females 2yrs   Males 1.5yrs Longevity: Approx. 3- 5 years in wild state, 15yrs in captivity. Vocalisation: The Dingo does not bark. Will howl to locate individuals and warn off strangers. A bark howl and cough are used in the presence of danger, alarming pups or pack members to flee or hide. Threats: Hybridisation with the domestic dog Canis familiaris. Poisoning, trapping and shooting. Erosion of habitat.

---