African Wild Dogs

African wild dogs, also known as African painted dogs, are constant wanderers that live in the woodlands and grasslands of southern Africa. Though they belong to the dog family, they are often mistaken for hyenas. These beautiful creatures have unique patterns of black, brown, and white splotches all over their body. They have large round ears to help keep them cool and give them excellent hearing, and long legs that enable them to run quickly and for long stretches at a time.

African wild dogs live in a social structure much like that of wolves. There is one alpha pair, and generally there are five to twenty dogs in a pack (San Diego Zoo). The alpha dogs are the only pair to have puppies, and a female can have up to twenty-one puppies in a single litter (San Diego Zoo). All of the adults in the pack help care for the puppies as well as for injured pack members; packs form very strong bonds. One unique thing about African painted dogs is that the females leave to start new packs, while males remain in the pack they were born to. This is very unusual in the animal world.

Each morning, the dogs greet each other with yaps and play fighting as they prepare for the morning hunt. African painted dogs hunt twice a day, once at dawn and once at dusk. These predators are one of the most successful hunters in Africa for several reasons; one is that their coats blend together, confusing and disorienting their prey. The other reason is that the African wild dogs hunt in relay form, enabling them to far outlast their prey's stamina. Their diet usually consists of Thompson's gazelles, impalas, and puku antelope.

Sadly, the African painted dog population is on the decline. At one point, it could be found in most parts of Africa south of the Sahara desert. Now, however, it has vanished from more than half of the countries it used to reside in. This is a result of habitat loss and encroachment of farmland. Since each dog pack needs between 80 and 800 square miles in which to live, most national parks are not big enough for even one African wild dog pack (San Diego Zoo). Outside of national parks African wild dogs are sometimes killed, and this plus habitat fragmentation has resulted in the African painted dog becoming the second most endangered carnivore in Africa.

Sna Diego Zoo: http://www.sdzoo.com/animalbytes/t-wild_dog.html