![]() Portrait of a Large Dog from New Holland by George Stubbs, 1772. The dingo plays a prominent role in the Dreamtime stories of indigenous Australians however, it rarely appears depicted in their cave paintings when compared with the extinct thylacine, also known as the Tasmanian wolf or Tasmanian tiger. The dingo is recognised as a native animal under the laws of all Australian jurisdictions. Numerous population-control measures have been implemented since then, with only limited success. When livestock farming began expanding across Australia in the early 19th century, dingoes began preying on sheep and cattle. The first British colonists who settled at Port Jackson in 1788 recorded dingoes living with indigenous Australians, and later at Melville Island in 1818, and the lower Darling and Murray rivers in 1862, indicating that dingoes were under some form of domestication by aboriginal Australians. A dingo pack usually consists of a mated pair, their offspring from the current year, and sometimes offspring from the previous year. The dingo's competitors include the native quoll, the introduced European red fox and the feral cat. As Australia's largest extant terrestrial predators, dingoes prey on mammals up to the size of the large red kangaroo, in addition to birds, reptiles, fish, crabs, frogs, insects, and seeds. The dingo's habitat covers most of Australia, but they are absent in the southeast and Tasmania, and an area in the southwest (see map). Dingo morphology has not changed over the past 3,500 years: this suggests that no artificial selection has been applied over this period. However, genomic analysis indicates that the dingo reached Australia 8,300 years ago but the human population which brought them remains unknown. The earliest known dingo fossil, found in Western Australia, dates to 3,450 years ago. The dingo is closely related to the New Guinea singing dog, or the New Guinea Highland wild dog: their lineage split early from the lineage that led to today's domestic dogs, and can be traced back through the Maritime Southeast Asia to Asia. The skull is wedge-shaped and appears large in proportion to the body. The dingo's three main coat colourations are light ginger or tan, black and tan, or creamy white. The dingo is a medium-sized canine that possesses a lean, hardy body adapted for speed, agility, and stamina. It is variously considered a form of domestic dog not warranting recognition as a subspecies, a subspecies of dog or wolf, or a full species in its own right. Its taxonomic classification is debated as indicated by the variety of scientific names presently applied in different publications. The dingo ( Canis familiaris, Canis familiaris dingo, Canis dingo, or Canis lupus dingo ) is an ancient ( basal) lineage of dog found in Australia. Dingo on the beach at Fraser Island, Queensland ![]()
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