Field Guide to African Painted Dog
Chapter One: Introducing African Wild Painted Dog!
Fun facts, ID, and More
THERE IS A LOT MORE TO AFRICAN PAINTED DOG THAN MEETS THE EYE, THIS SUCCESSFUL PREDATOR IS A COMMUNITY MINDED, TEAM PLAYER WHO IS WILLING TO GO HUNGRY IN THE EFFORT TO FEED HIS PACK. IMAGE: ©MARC CRONJE, NATURALIST AND FIELD GUIDE.
✓ Trip Tips: Painted Dogs
Who: Families, photographers
What: African Safari
Where: Africa. See Chapter 4: Best Places
When: See Chapter 4 Best Places for best times.
How: Mobile safari with naturalist guide.
The African Painted dog is unlike any other predator on the African continent. At once familiar and yet very different from our four-legged family members. If you are fortunate enough to watch a painted dog community, you will never forget them.
This is Chapter 1 of our 4-part Field Guide to African Painted Dogs.
Let’s start with some fun!
24 Fun Facts about African Wild Painted Dog
1. A Coat of Many Colors. The painted dog coat is like our fingerprints, unique to each individual.
2. Harmonious Families. There is very little aggression in painted dog communities, even in the choice of the alpha pair. The pair that most effectively care for the pack become the leaders. Often they are a younger pair.
3. Family Structure Like Grey Wolves. Painted dog packs are most structurally like grey wolf packs. They are tightly knit, and all pack members care for the pups, elder members, and sick.
4. Females Empowerment! In a pack, it is usual for every male member to be related because the females leave the natal group and strike out on their own at maturity, not the males, as in most species.
5. Lots of Siblings. Painted dogs have the biggest litter of any canid, 2 – 20 pups at a time, with twice as many males as females born!
6. Different Than your Dog. African dogs have four toes and 40 teeth instead of the five toes and 42 teeth of other canid species.
PAINTED DOG HUNTING PARTY NEAY AFSALL IN KRUGER NATIONAL PARK, SOUTH AFRICA. IMAGE: THANKS TO ©MARC CRONJE, NATURIST AND FIELD GUIDE
7. The Better to Hear You. Their distinctive big round ears help the painted dogs to keep track of each other.
8. Twilight Hunters. Painted dogs hunt in the hours between dark and light, twilight, when their prey is most active, and the dogs blend most effectively into the scenery, giving them cover from both their prey and predators.
9. Rally the Troops! Before a hunt, painted dogs rev each other up in a ceremony. They jump and play, circling, touching each other, and vocalizing until they head off en masse.
10. Decision by Sneeze. A "sneeze" or series of "sneezes" may determine the start of the hunt. According to a 2017 study by the Royal Society, the rapid exhale or a "sneeze" by one pack member, followed by the "sneezes" of pack members, seemed to indicate the pack's readiness to head off.
11. Divide, Conquer, then Eat Together. Sometimes, hunting parties split up, with part of the group following one hunt leader and other members going together after a different target. This is more of a way to ensure a kill for the "family” and not competition between pack members. All members come back together to help take down prey and to share in the catch.
12. In Your Face Attitude. Painted dogs will sometimes signal a hunting target by walking right up to the animal, not ambushing it.
AFRICAN PAINTED DOG DOES NOT HUNT BY AMBUS. THEY HAVE BEEN KNOWN TO GET RIGHT INTO THE FACE OF THEIR PREY. THE PAINTED DOGS HUNT AS A TEAM WITH DIFFERENT INDIVIDUALS TAKING THE LEAD. IMAGE: ©MARC CRONJE, NATURALIST AND WILDLIFE FIELD GUIDE
13. Turning Weak-jawed Lemons to Deadly Lemon Aid. Painted dogs do not have the strong jaws for the kill-bite that most predators employ. Instead, the hunting party works together to bring down prey, circling it and attacking from all sides.
14. Long-Range Athletes: Painted dogs have fantastic stamina and the ability to run at speeds up to 35mph (56.3 km) for over 3 miles (4.8 km). They outlast their prey's endurance.
15. Teamwork and Endurance Equal a Win. Their physical endurance gives painted dogs one of the best hunt success rates in the African animal kingdom: 80% instead of the 20-30% average success rate of lions, leopards, or cheetahs.
16. Gorge and Share: Food is consumed quickly, on the spot, to keep it from being stolen by larger predators, but the entire pack shares the kill, including the ones who did not or could not help in the hunt.
17. Beg and Whine: After gorging, the dogs return to the den area, where non-hunting pack members beg food from each other by whining and licking each other's mouths.
18. Everyone gets Fed: Painted dogs readily regurgitate their meal for the young, sick, elderly, healthy 'babysitters" and others back at the den.
PAINTED DOGS HAVE VERY TIGHTLY KNIT PACK, EVERY MEMBER IS TAKEN CARE OF, INCLUDING THE OLDER LESS ABLE MEMBERS, THE VERY YOUNG, SICK OR HURT. IMAGE: ©MARC CRONJE, NATURIST AND WILDLIFE FIELD GUIDE.
19. Generous to a Fault: So much food is given back, that the hunters sometimes end up going hungry.
20. Community Work: A larger pack will hunt every day and sometimes more than once a day to feed the community.
21. Painted Dogs are Wanderers: They rarely stay in one place very long. Some packs have been recorded as ranging over 900 sq. miles of territory to thrive.
22. Beware of Lions: Lions are the painted dogs' greatest natural enemy. Lions will raid a den, killing all the pups, which is why painted dogs never use any single den for long.
23. And Food Stealing Hyenas: Bigger and stronger Hyenas are notorious thieves of painted dog kills.
25. Good Neighbors, Good Friends: There are few if any, verified instances of a painted dog in the wild attacking a man or even showing aggressive behavior toward each other. They rarely strike at livestock.
24. But The Greatest Threat is Man: Habitat loss, followed by humans' extirpation of the painted dog in large areas of their traditional range, is the single greatest threat to African painted dog survival and has put it on the Endangered species list.
Other Names for African Painted Dogs
African wild dog, painted wolf, painted hunting dog, African hunting dog, and Cape hunting dog.
PAINTED DOGS ARE REMARKABLE EASY GOING INSIDE THE PACK AGGRESSION TOWARDS EACH OTHER IS RARE. THEY ARE MORE LIKELY TO GOVE THEIR FOOD TO EACH OTHER FIRST THAN TO KEEP IT FOR THEMSELVES. THIS PARTICULAR GUY DOES NOT EVEN SEEM TO MIND THE FLY ON HIS NOSE. IMAGE: THANKS TO ©MARC CRONJE, NATURALIST AND WILDLIFE FIELS GUIDE
All in the Family
Genus and Species: Lycaon pictus
Subspecies of African Painted Dog: The painted dog has five subspecies: L.p lupines, L.p manguensis, L.p pictus, L.p sharicus, and L.p somalicus. For additional information on subspecies, please see Chapter 3: Conservation “More on Painted Dog Subspecies.”
Closest Living Relative: There is no close living relative to the painted dog.
What Species are Related to African Painted Dogs?
Although their scientific name: Lycon pictus translates as “painted wolf,” they are genetically far removed from the 35 other wild canid species. Painted dogs split from the ancestor they have in common with wolves and domestic dogs over 3 million years ago. They evolved along a line that includes, but is also far removed from, the Indian dhole, Cuon alpinus, and South African bush dog, Speothos venaticus. Painted dog is the only species in its genus. They cannot interbreed with any other species.
What’s the Difference Between African Painted and My Domestic Dog?
This is Not Your Family Pet Gone Wild!
Painted dogs look like our four-legged family members and they sure do have some of the same behaviors, but it is important to remember that painted dogs are NOT feral domestic dogs.
It is almost impossible not to smile when you see these animals interacting. Painted dog communities are tightly knit. They greet each other enthusiastically with yelps and tail-wagging; they jump, play, and tease each other. They rev each other up before a hunt, and later they all sleep together.
But painted dogs do not bark or howl and are genetically different from Canis lupus familiaris. They have four toes on all paws, domestic dogs have five on their front paws. And unlike other canids, not all painted dog males lift a leg to urinate. Only the alpha pair, both male and female, lift their legs in the painted dog's world; all others squat.
THE COLOR VARIATIONS AND PATTERNS ON A PAINTED DOG ARE LIKE FINGER PRINTS, NO TWO ARE THE SAME. ALL PAINTED DOGS HAVE BLACK NOSES AND THAT BRIGHT WHITE TIPPED TAIL. THIS APD IS AT KRUGER NATIONAL PARK, SOUTH AFRICA. IMAGE THANKS TO MARC CRONJE, NATURALIST AND WILDLIFE FIELD GUIDE.
How to Identify African Painted Dogs
Adult Height: 29 – 43 inches (75 – 110 cm) at the shoulder
Adult Weight: 35 – 80 pounds (16 – 36 kg)
Usually female painted dogs are larger and more powerful than the males.
Painted Dog Distinguishing Features
Painted dogs are immediately recognizable for two features: prominent, rounded ears that stand straight up from their heads and the mottled coats that give them their name and make them look like a modernist painting in black, brown, red, white, yellow, and gold.
The white bushy tail-tip tip is another painted dog characteristic. And their muzzles are always black.
The coloring of painted dogs in the northeast of Africa tend to be darker; the south populations tend to have brighter coloration.
How to Distinguish Between Painted Dog and Hyena
African painted Dogs are often mistaken for the more widely known hyena, but they are very different and not related. The hyena is more closely related to cats than dogs.
Physically the hyena can outweigh an African painted dog by 100 or more pounds (+45 kilos), their ears are smaller and pointed at the tips, and their coloring can be spotted (crocuta crocuta,) stripped (hyaena Hyaena) or plain brown (parahyaena brunnea), but will not have the marvelous patterns of the African painted dog. Hyenas are also more aggressive than the community-minded African painted dog. You will rarely find a hyena community playing together.
Hyenas are also opportunistic, and will try to steal African painted dog’s kill.
African painted or wild dogs work together fearlessly to defend against opportunistic hyenas who regularly attempt to steal the painted dogs' kill. Image: ©Mtrolle⎮dreamstime.com
Special Thanks
Peter Bliston, David Kuvawoga, and Jealous Mpofu of The Painted Dog Conservation, Hwange, Africa. Follow on Facebook
Marc Cronje, Independent Field Guide, South Africa. Follow Marc on Facebook Read Marc’s Interview and thoughts on African Painted Dogs here.
DONLT LET THS BE “GOOD-BY” TO PAINTED DOG, SEEK THEM OUT AND SEND US YOUR IMPRESSIONS! IMAGE THANKS TO ©MARC CRONJE, NATURALIST AND INDEPENDENT FIELD GUIDE.
