November 25, 2016
Residents in the McLean and Shelleytop roads areas at Durong have been warned to keep a close eye on their stock after nine sheep were killed by wild dogs this week.
The alert comes from a possibly unlikely source … Simon Stretton who runs the Durong Dingo Sanctuary just up the road from where the attacks occurred.
His dingoes are kept in caged runs inside special enclosures which makes it impossible for them to escape, so Simon knew they were not to blame when he received an urgent request on Thursday morning via his website to ring a local number.
“It was the new neighbours up the end of the road,” Simon said.
“They told me nine of their 19 sheep had been attacked by wild dogs or dingoes and two were still alive.”
Simon said his neighbour, Mick, did not have a rifle to euthanase the badly wounded sheep.
“So I went up with gun and camera,” he said.
“As I arrived, the owner yelled out that a dog had the ram by the throat where it was laying beside a log.
“The dog had run off by the time I got out of my van, so I began tracking it because it kept barking – that proved it wasn’t a dingo.
“Two hundred metres later I got a sighting.
“It was a 35kg-plus big yellow dog, but it didn’t remain still long enough for me to get off an accurate head shot. It headed back east.”
Simon said he wasn’t able to track the dog much further, but he saw it head towards other properties.
“I returned home to get my tractor to dig a hole to bury the dead sheep,” he said.
Simon said Mick told him he believed there had been two types of attacks.
“The first two killed sheep were totally eaten out, leaving only the rib cage, and wool,” Simon said.
“Then last night (Wednesday night) the others were ripped into the left flank leaving the innards bulging out.
“All this happened 80-100 metres from his house!
“He also has three dogs spaced around his house and they didn’t bark during the attack, so it shows how silently these wild dogs began their carnage.
“I had believed that since my Dingo Sanctuary started, their howling had driven away all wild dogs.
“There are about four properties in my road that are now running sheep, so this could be a contributing factor for the wild dogs to return. Or maybe they belong to nearby properties?
“I phoned the police of my intention to shoot the injured sheep, as the owners didn’t own a firearm.
“I also phoned South Burnett Shire Council’s Wild Dog Officer and asked him to bring out some trapping cages.
“He suggests if they are wild dogs they will be almost impossible to catch, but if they are domestic dogs there is a better chance of catching them.”
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[Warning: Some readers may find the following photos distressing]
Everyone who reads this must remember that these wild dogs that are doing this are just trying to survive in this world of ours. Simply put if they don’t eat they die – exactly the same thing that would happen to us humans if we didn’t eat. Humans, however, have welfare and support systems in place to fall back on if we can’t feed ourselves but wild animals do not have that luxury. Think about this next time you hear about these hungry wild animals killing to survive.