Classification and Range
But by 1996, viable populations could only be found in Tanzania, extreme northeastern South Africa, across most of Botswana, parts of Zimbabwe, and tiny areas of Namibia, Angola and Zambia. In many of these countries, the species survives only in national parks and other protected areas.

If you like this animal and find it particularly fascinating you can adopt it!

Reproduction
African wild dogs live in packs comprising several related males and from one to several related females (females are unrelated to males). There are separate male and female dominance hierarchies, and in most cases only the highest-ranking (or alpha) male and female mate. When any female is in estrous and ready to mate, the alpha male strives to keep all other males away from her. If the estrous female is not the alpha individual, the alpha female tries to keep her sexually receptive subordinate away from any male. The alpha female may even urinate over any spot an estrous female urinates on, thereby covering the other's scent. When the alpha female is in estrous, the alpha male still tries to keep her to himself, but she may choose to mate with one or more males in addition to the alpha male.

Breeding occurs once a year, timed to coincide with abundant prey. When the dominant female becomes pregnant, she selects a pre-existing den, usually an abandoned aardvark hole. Gestation ranges from 69-73 days, whereupon the female gives birth to anywhere from two to 19 pups, though a typical litter size is seven to 10. The pups are blind and almost naked at birth, and weigh about 14 ounces (397 g). The mother stays in the den with her pups, and the rest of the pack feeds her regurgitated meat.

At 2-3 weeks of age, pups begin to venture out of the den, and soon begin to eat regurgitated meat offered by the adults. Weaning is usually complete by 10 weeks after birth. Once the litter is primarily eating meat, they begin running out to meet the returning hunters, rather than waiting at the den. As time goes on, the pups venture farther from the den until they are finally arriving at kills. This allows the pups to transition from being fed by the pack, to eating from the carcass on their own. By the age of 5 months, they accompany the adults when they leave to hunt, although they will not be skilled hunters themselves until they are 12-14 months old.

Life Cycle
Female African wild dogs leave their natal pack when they are between 14-30 months old. All females in a litter disperse from the pack together. Only about half of the young adult males disperse (also as a group), while the rest remain in their natal pack for life. A new pack forms when a group of sisters from one originating pack meets a group of brothers from another. Females are more aggressive about fighting for dominance than males, and when one female establishes alpha status among the females, some or all of her sisters will sometimes leave the new pack to seek opportunities for alpha status elsewhere.

African wild dogs are nomadic throughout most of the year, wandering in ranges that may cover 579 square miles (1,500 square km) or more. The exception is when the pack has very young pups. The adults then restrict their hunting to a 1.25 mile (2 km) radius around the den. By the time the pups are 3 months old, the pack usually abandons the den and resumes nomadic life.

E Pluribus Unum (From the Many, One)
While many other pack-living canids can adapt to living alone, African wild dogs are truly lost without each other. A pack will search relentlessly for a lost member, crying out with a peculiar bell-like hoot and listening for lonely hoots in return. Their basic instinct to stay together is strong, but training supplements instinct from an early age. Returning hunters growl and snap at single pups attempting to beg food —— only pups that beg as a group get fed. Adults may also threaten pups that wander away, scaring them into running back to the pack for protection!

The most distinctive feature of African wild dogs' social life is how well they get along. Even the scene at a kill is polite and orderly, with pups eating first while the adults fend off scavengers. They frequently use ritualized gestures of appeasement, this usually prevents any serious fighting. Most appeasement behavior is ritualized food-begging, but other gestures are familiar to anyone who owns a pet dog, such as whining, tail-wagging, and rolling over to expose the belly. All pack members regularly nuzzle and lick each other's muzzles. Appeasement of the alpha female sometimes takes the form of adults lying down and ritually attempting to nurse!

A Merry Meeting
To end their night or midday rest and prepare for the hunt, an African wild dog pack engages in an elaborate ritual known as "the meet." The meet begins when a few individuals get up from their resting places and approach others, sniffing them and licking their muzzles. As activity increases, juveniles begin to run about, begging food and emitting twittering, bird-like calls. Soon, all the dogs get up and greet one another. If subordinates fail to offer spontaneous appeasement gestures, high-ranking pack members may threaten them to elicit the behavior. As the meet continues, the dogs become very excited, bouncing and leaping at one another. There is much play-fighting, with dogs rearing up to paw at each other or trying to push others onto the ground. Finally, when the whole pack fully engages in group activity, it runs off to begin the hunt.

Many Mr. Moms
The social structure of an African wild dog pack is nearly opposite the typical pattern of social mammals. In species such as baboons, lions and elephants, the usual structure is a stable group of several related females, with one or two related males joining the group to breed until the dominant position is usurped by another male. In such species, females remain with their mothers, aunts and sisters for life, and primarily females care for the young. This is not the case with an African wild dog pack. Since young adult males frequently remain with their original pack, this forms a core group of fathers, uncles and brothers. While females do not migrate in and out of packs, there are few females in any given pack—sometimes only one.

Additionally, after weaning the pups, their mother and any aunts may quickly lose interest in them, leaving most of their care to the adult males. One researcher observed a pack in which the sole female died when her pups were just 5 weeks old. Though the pups were only halfway to the age when they would normally be weaned, their father and uncles were able to successfully rear them to adulthood!

What's that smell?
Many species, especially canids, combine scent marking with vocal and/or visual signaling to communicate territory or presence. African wild dogs are unusual among canids; they infrequently directly encounter other wild dogs from outside their own social group and therefore rarely vocalize with these other groups. Scent communication offers several advantages to wild dogs. The information lasts longer, is identified with an exact location, and avoids immediate and potentially threatening attention to the presence of the signaler. Since there is a great diversity of large predators and competitors on the African savanna, these advantages may be particularly important. Chemical communication through scent marking is probably the primary means by which wild dogs gather information regarding pack boundaries.

African wild dogs are seen in the zoo's award-winning African Savanna exhibit. Other species you will find there include the hippopotamus, giraffe, fringe-eared oryx, zebra and lion.

Although they used to thrive in most of sub-Saharan Africa, African wild dogs are now an endangered species.** Today, they live in isolated and widely scattered packs, mainly in national parks or wildlife refuges in eastern and southern Africa. The huge decline in wild dog populations and their range is due mostly to habitat loss and fragmentation.

Researchers estimate there are fewer than 5,600 adults left in the wild. Some populations are declining by as much as 20% every two generations. If this trend continues, African wild dogs could be extinct in the wild within 10-30 years.

Several other factors push these animals toward extinction:

• People confuse wild dogs with feral, domestic dogs and shoot them on sight
• Livestock owners, fearing for their livelihood, kill wild dogs with guns, snares and poisons
• Lions sometimes kill 50% of the pups in a wild dog pack (nobody knows why)
• Diseases like rabies, distemper and anthrax (often from domestic dogs) kill entire packs
• Hyenas drive wild dogs from recently killed prey, then eat whatever the dogs have killed
• Automobiles kill many wild dogs, especially in and around national parks and reserves

African wild dogs are also the target of much outright hatred throughout their range, based primarily on unfounded beliefs about the wild dogs' "murderous" nature, similar to beliefs long held about wolves, coyotes or foxes in North America. Consequently, many nations do not protect the species at all. Those that do often provide protection only in national parks and other reserves, leaving it legal to kill them when they wander outside protected boundaries—something that inevitably happens with this nomadic species.

Woodland Park Zoo Is Helping-With Your Support!
For an animal as endangered as the African wild dog, flexible and sustainable conservation programs are essential. Partnerships with other zoos can support healthy captive populations, while in-situ fieldwork such as the Botswana Wild Dog Research Project provides on-ground solutions.

An example of field projects aimed at conserving wild populations of this species is the Botswana Wild Dog Research Project (BWDRP). BWDRP is a predator conservation program of applied conservation and education with African wild dogs as its flagship species. A Seattle native, Dr. J. W. ("Tico") McNutt heads this project. The overall goal of the project is to promote through applied research, management, and public education, the conservation of African wild dogs in conflict with human communities. Mr. McNutt is one of the few biologists in the world who works on wild dog research and conservation. Mr. McNutt has studied wild dog populations in Botswana since 1989, using radio collars and an ultralight airplane to track them. In recent years, Mr. McNutt has focused more on wild dog conservation, while continuing to monitor their populations through detailed life history characteristics, social behavior and dispersal. His spouse, Lesley Boggs, is an anthropologist, and together they tackle issues concerning wildlife survival in an increasingly human-dominated world. One technique they're investigating is the "biofence." This method relies on carefully chosen and placed scents to encourage wild dogs to stay within the boundaries of wildlife refuges and thus avoid conflicts with people. However, these dogs are not as territorial as other carnivores and travel a great deal; containing them in one area is a challenge. Woodland Park Zoo has joined with this project as one of our Partners for Wildlife. Together, we plan a long-term conservation partnership with McNutt and Boggs, while supporting their excellent, essential work.

Each in-situ project supported by the zoo aims to provide a broad, holistic approach to conservation, encompassing research, education, habitat and species preservation. This includes comprehensive, cooperative strategies to link the needs of animals with the people who share their ecosystems.

For more information on the African Wild Dog Conservation Project, visit the page in our Conservation section.

How You Can Help!
Woodland Park Zoo contributes information to the captive breeding, husbandry and public awareness of this intriguing native species. The effort to save animal species requires cooperation and support at the international, national, regional and individual levels. You can help in this cause. Join and become active in Woodland Park Zoo and other conservation organizations of your choice. Let your elected representatives know your views on protecting endangered species and wild habitats. Please do not buy products made from wild animal parts.

Contact Woodland Park Zoo at webkeeper@zoo.org to find out how you can support conservation efforts at the zoo. Learn other ways you can help conserve wildlife and the habitats they require for survival by visiting our How You Can Help page.

Sources and Suggested Reading
Ginsburg, J.R. and D.W. Macdonald, 1990. Foxes, Wolves, Jackals, and Dogs: An Action Plan for the Conservation of Canids . International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources: Gland, Switzerland. 116 p.

Hilton-Taylor, C. (compiler) 2000. 2000 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species . IUCN, Gland, Switzerland and Cambridge, UK. xviii + 61pp. Downloaded on 29 August 2001.

Kingdon, Jonathan. 1977. East African Mammals, Vol. IIIA (Carnivores) . The University of Chicago Press, Chicago IL. 476 p.

Macdonald, David. 1984. The Encyclopedia of Mammals . Facts on File, Inc. New York, NY. 895 p.

McNutt, John, et al. 1997. Running Wild: Dispelling the Myths of the African Wild Dog . Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington DC. 150p.

Nowak, Ronald M. 1991. Walker's Mammals of the World . The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore and London. 1629 p.

Wilson, Don E. and Reeder, Deeann M. 1993. Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, 2nd edition . Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D. C. 1206 p.

An exhibit preview and interpretive primer for the African Wild Dog Exhibit at WPZ: Gary Mozel

For Kids!
Van Lawick, Hugo. 1974. Solo: The Story of an African Wild Dog. Houghton Mifflin, Boston MA. 159 p.

Other Resources
The University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web

*Taxonomic classification varies between references. Classification information used in this fact sheet was taken from Mammal Species of the World: A Taxonomic and Geographic Reference, 2nd edition, edited by Don E. Wilson and DeeAnn M. Reeder, 1993.

**There are several international and federal agencies that determine the endangered status of species. WPZ designates a species as endangered if it is listed as endangered on the IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature) Red List, the US Fish & Wildlife Service's Endangered Species List, or on Appendix I of CITES (Convention on the International Trade of Endangered Species of Flora and Fauna).