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Great Dingo Facts for Kids

navajocodetalkersadmin on April 29, 2015 - 12:00 pm in Fun Facts for Kids

Dingos are canines that live in Australia and Asia. Dingos have some unique features. They cannot bark but they can howl. They have rotating wrists unlike other canines which means that they can rotate door knobs and get into other things that typical dogs cannot. A dingo can also turn its head in either direction by about 180 degrees.

Australian dingoes are larger than Asian dingoes. They weigh between 26 and 35 pounds. Most Australian dingoes are either a sandy color or a ginger color. Dingoes can live in the wild until they are about 10 but if they have been cared for by humans than can live as long as 15 years.

Training

Wild dingoes have had a hard time of being domesticated. They are highly intelligent animals but do not take to training to live in the human world well. They live out in the open in both Australia and Asia and have not really been domesticated successfully.

Breeding

Dingoes breed in the fall. The gestation period is 2 months. There is some concern involving genetic purity of the breed because many wild dingoes have begun to breed with stray domestic dogs. The average liter of dingo pups can range greatly between 1 and 10.

They travel in packs and the dominant or alpha female in the pack will kill puppies born to other females. The pack will all care for the young of the dominant female. The babies are weaned at 8 weeks and are fed solid foods sometimes in the form of regurgitated food from the older dingoes in the group.

They only have one liter a year.

What Do They Eat?

They are carnivores so they eat small rodents and birds. They even eat carrion (dead animals on the side of the road). They are opportunistic eaters in other words they eat what they can catch nothing is off limits. They have even been known to prey on Kangaroos.

Nuisance

Dingoes are considered a nuisance animal around Sydney and other big cities in Australia. Their unique adaptations mean that they can get into places that domestic dogs cannot. While they are truly loved in Australia they have been relegated as nuisance animals because they have been known to attack domestic livestock as well.

There are steps in place to further the conservation of the wild dingo to preserve the blood line.

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