African Wild Dogs: On the Front Line

by Brendan Whittington-Jones

450 is optimistically the number of free-ranging African wild dogs left in South Africa. The immediate future of this dynamic, endangered, large carnivore is in the hands of a thinly spread, intensely committed network of conservationists, donors, state reserves and progressive landowners. When an opportunity to study wild dogs through the Endangered Wildlife Trust presented itself to Brendan Whittington-Jones in 2007, he arrived in Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park naïve to the challenges of real wildlife conservation. The next seven years were a flood of lessons in the complexity and fascination of wild dog management, anger management, diplomacy, optimism, as well as being a wild dog travel agent. This book lifts the gloss and illusion off a wedge of carnivore conservation, and reveals a snapshot of characters (human and canid) and organizations that tread the murky waters of trying to ensure the species’ persistence in South Africa.

Genres: Nonfiction, Africa, Nature

220 pages, Paperback

First published February 1, 2015

About the author

Brendan Whittington-Jones wanted to save animals, somewhere, anywhere.

He grew up in suburban Cape Town, South Africa, with Tintin and David Attenborough as references to worlds of adventure. Degrees in Zoology and Wildlife Management fuelled his ambition to work in wild landscapes. He currently works for the Sharjah Environment and Protected Areas Authority.

After sixteen years of work as a conservation biologist, including a diversion to clean up after zoo animals in Iraq, Afghanistan and the USA, he realised there was one crucial message to get out to humanity; most wildlife conservation and animal welfare heroes are the understated, tenacious characters who can cooperate and enjoy a laugh when it would be easier not to.

Brendan is the author of two books, African Wild Dogs: On the Front Line and The Accidental Invasion of Baghdad Zoo. He is not a bestselling, award-winning author, but one of his books made his wife cry a little, so he uses that as personal validation.

Reviews

[Paz · Rating 3 out of 5]

En realidad, habla fundamentalmente de la administración y el día a día de un parque natural, y no menciona casi a los animales

[Rachel (Sfogs) · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was fascinating. Very detailed in the complexities of population and meta-population management. Especially when faced with lots of threats to the wild dogs themselves.

[DC · Rating 1 out of 5]

Gave up on this one. The author didn't characterize any of the people or dogs in a way to make them at all sympathetic. Very light on wild dog ecology.
I've moved on to the book Running Wild, which is much more informative.

This one read like bullet points with forced, unfunny jokes interjected and not as a coherent narrative.

[Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating insight into these endangered, wily, elusive creatures

[Mei Mandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book showed me a reality picture of the difficulties wildlife conservatives are facing on conserve African Wild Dog/Painted Wolf/ African Hunting Dog - a specie that is unheard of by most people and being most-misunderstood by people who have heard of them, but yet so needed to be converse. Not only because it's the last of its genus (Lycaon), but also because of once you really get to know this engender specie, you just can’t stop fall in love with them. I worried for their future, and pray for more people will get to know them, and will support the conservatives work for them.