WILD DOGS OF BOTSWANA

Everyone comes to Africa to see the big 5. But, in most cases, people are more impressed with other things, especially when something amazing happens…

Wild dogs are endangered and probably the most difficult predator in Africa to spot due to their huge territories and extremely low numbers.
The African Wild Dog is endangered by human overpopulation, habitat loss and hunting. It uses very large territories (and so can persist only in large wildlife protected areas), and it is strongly affected by competition with larger carnivores that rely on the same prey base, particularly the lion and the Spotted Hyena. Lions often will kill as many wild dogs as they can but do not eat them. Hyenas usually follow them to steal their kills. One on one the hyena is much more powerful than the Wild Dog but a large group of Wild Dogs can successfully chase off a small number of hyenas because of their teamwork. It is also killed by livestock herders and game hunters, though it is typically no more (perhaps less) persecuted than other carnivores that pose more threat to livestock. Most of Africa’s national parks are too small for a pack of wild dogs, so the packs expand to the unprotected areas, which tend to be ranch or farm land. Ranchers and farmers protect their domestic animals by killing the wild dogs. Like other carnivores, the African Wild Dog is sometimes affected by outbreaks of viral diseases such as rabies, distemper, and parvovirus. Although these diseases are not more pathogenic or virulent for wild dogs, the small size of most wild dog populations makes them vulnerable to local extinction due to diseases or other problems.

On one of our excursions through Botswana’s “wild parks” (Moremi Game Reserve and Chobe National Park) we were lucky enough to see a separate pack of wild dogs in different areas everyday… for 5 days consecutively! On one particular day we got so close to one pack that the dogs surrounded our game viewer. They started to inspect it and one even jumped up on its’ hind legs to get a better view of what was happening inside!

We sat and studied the dogs for hours, knowing that we were very privileged to have such a good sighting of this endangered species.

By Jamie