
A Merino weaner killed in a suspected dingo attack in north-west Victoria.
DINGO attacks on sheep in north-west Victoria are increasing as camera monitoring shows rising incursions into farm property adjacent to the Big Desert Wilderness Park in north-west Victoria.
Lawloit sheep producer Alan Bennett said he was aware there have been hundreds of images of wild dogs or dingoes, including a pack of four animals, coming into his ‘Stranraer’ property south of the Broken Bucket Tank Bushland Reserve.
Mr Bennett said there have been four attacks since last Sunday with up to 15 deaths among his ewes and evidence of injuries to lambs found during shearing recently, with losses estimated at about 2 percent since marking.
“We haven’t really had attacks like that on the east side of the Nhill-Murrayville Road.
“I just think they are roaming more freely, obviously looking for water.”
Mr Bennett said of the 2000 images recorded by Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action cameras around his property, 240 were of dogs over a two-week period in January.
“They are just roaming far and wide and we are seeing an unprecedented number of different dogs in the area that have been identified on cameras.
“I actually think that what we are seeing now is there is a change in the behaviour of the dogs because they know they’ve got access to the open country, much the same as we see a change in the behaviour of kangaroos and emus accessing open country for feed and water.”
After meeting resistance in accessing images from the DEECA cameras, Mr Bennett’s daughter set up their own cameras to record dingo movements.
“Four hours after she set one up she got an image of two dogs inside our property going under a gate to access water.”
Mr Bennett said exclusion fencing to the west of the Murrayville Road seemed to have pushed the dingoes to walk into different areas.
“There are some good water points in that particular block and it looks like they have come in from the north, from the Broken Bucket Reserve and they’re just travelling across the property looking for water.
“They are ranging everywhere.”
Mr Bennett said the setting up of the DEECA cameras was the only form of visible support he has had from the State Government since the wild dog unprotection order and buffer was discontinued on 14 March last year.
Mr Bennett said it has been the hottest and driest summer in his memory.
“There would absolutely not be a drop of water in the Big Desert (park), we’ve got water on our farms and for some reason, my anecdotal assessment is that they prefer to drink from a waterhole than a trough.
“They are walking past troughs in paddocks to go to these clay holes that still have water in them (including one that is an overflow from a solar bore).”
Mr Bennett said sheep producers are afraid to put sheep in paddocks at risk of attack from dingoes, and he had stocked cattle instead.
“It’s not a matter of if they (the sheep) are going to get attacked, it’s when they are going to get attacked.
“We’ve got over 1000 hectares on one block (adjacent to the Big Desert Wilderness Park) that we have not put sheep on since before 14 March last year,” he said.
“We actually went and bought some steers to put up there and it’s not country you would normally run steers on, but otherwise we would have over a thousand hectares with not a hoof on it for over 12 months.”
Why is DEECA withholding information?
Current wild dog/dingo activity evidence should be available to landholders. It feels like they’re hiding something; maybe the truth.