Four alert African Painted Hunting Dogs, aka African Wild Dog, Lycaon pictus, photographed at a water hole in the Savuti/Savute area of Chobe National Park in Botswana, southern Africa.
Painted Dogs are an endangered species whose numbers have reduced dramatically since the mid-20th century. Now Botswana is one of their strongholds, particularly Chobe N.P., Moremi Game Reserve and the Okavango Delta.
They are colourful (especially the Southern African subspecies photographed above), attractive, and have fluffy, white tails. No two animals have the same pattern, so they can be easily distinguished, their coat pattern being their ‘fingerprint’. They are not related to Hyaenas, which which they are sometimes confused. They cannot interbreed with wolves or domestic dogs, not being closely-enough related to either (for example, they don’t have a dewclaw).
They hunt in packs, generally in savannah bushland, taking down small to medium-sized antelopes like Duiker, Impala and even Kudu. Packs can range from two to thirty animals, and are led by an Alpha male and female, who are usually the only pack members to breed. The Alpha pair make all the decisions relating to the survival of the pack.
There are only about 6,500 Painted Dogs left in the wild in Africa. Their main threats are habitat reduction, human persecution and disease.
This image is copyright © Liz Leyden. All rights strictly as agreed in writing with the author or her agent.
It is for sale as wall art or as various home or personal accessories at Pixels.com. I also have a range of other African Wild Dog images available there.
This African Wild Dog photo is also available to purchase as a stock photo from iStock, from where I have a selection of other African Painted Hunting Dog stock photos. The photo above is also available to buy as a stock image from GettyImages.
