Dr Julie Funnell
One boot thrown at a dingo sparked a life spent undoing decades of misconception about Australia's most misunderstood native animal.
Hear this story
Dr Julie Funnell grew up in the Blue Mountains exploring the bush, loving animals from age two. But when she moved to Townsville to work at James Cook University, she was still nervous around dogs after 13 years at a Sydney vet hospital. That changed when she volunteered at Billabong Sanctuary in 2013. On her first shift, she threw a boot at a dingo named King thinking he would chase it like a dog. The boot hit him in the forehead. That moment of miscalculation became the beginning of a complete rethinking of how she understood animals.
When Julie tried using old-fashioned dog training methods on the dingoes, they rejected her entirely. Dingoes are not domesticated dogs. They are independent, wary, and cautious of anything new in their environment, traits that help them survive in the wild. As Julie learned more, she discovered the scale of what most Australians didn't know: dingoes appear on postcards alongside kangaroos, yet they are also culled across the country in massive numbers. The term 'wild dog control' masks the fact that most animals being killed are actually dingoes, rebranded to justify lethal removal. Isolated in Australia for thousands of years, dingoes are genetically and behaviourally distinct from domestic dogs and play a vital role in regulating the ecosystem.
Julie's bond with King, Kalari, and Alira taught her that working with an animal's nature, rather than trying to dominate it, creates stronger bonds and better outcomes. She now advocates for coexistence: stable dingo packs combined with good livestock management can prevent predation on farms without requiring killing. She sees hope in regenerative agriculture practices gaining ground and, most importantly, in Traditional Owners finding their voice in how dingoes are managed on Country. Her message is simple: dingoes do not want to interact with humans. They just want to live their lives.
“Stop trying to fight it. Stop trying to dominate it and subdue it and make it do what you want it to do. And understand the nature of it and how you can work with it.”
“Dingoes will just look at you and go, you're horrible. Why would I do anything with you?”
“The way dingoes are regarded, they see, as they see everything as part of the landscape. It's all connected. Not one thing is separate.”
The hero, today
Dingoes are not domesticated dogs and never will be; they are independent, wary, and naturally cautious of anything new, which is how they survive in the wild, not a defect in their character. The majority of animals killed in 'wild dog control' programs are actually dingoes, not a separate wild dog species, and genetic testing shows the vast majority of dingoes across Australia are either completely pure or high-percentage dingo. Stable dingo packs left to settle naturally, combined with good livestock husbandry and guardian animals for sheep, can achieve coexistence with grazing businesses without requiring lethal control. The relationships Dr Funnell built with King, Kalari, and Alira taught her that working with an animal's nature rather than trying to dominate it creates stronger bonds and better outcomes, a lesson that applies far beyond dingoes. Dingoes have been isolated in Australia for thousands of years and are genetically and behaviourally distinct from domestic dogs; they belong in the Australian ecosystem and are vital ecological regulators when left to function as stable packs. The biggest threat to dingoes is not their behaviour but human fear shaped by isolated incidents like K'gari, combined with agricultural practices that fragment packs and turn them into unstable groups more likely to cause harm.
Yes. Dr Julie Funnell is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Dingoes are not domesticated dogs and never will be; they are independent, wary, and naturally cautious of anything new, which is how they survive in the wild, not a defect in their character.
The majority of animals killed in 'wild dog control' programs are actually dingoes, not a separate wild dog species, and genetic testing shows the vast majority of dingoes across Australia are either completely pure or high-percentage dingo.
Stable dingo packs left to settle naturally, combined with good livestock husbandry and guardian animals for sheep, can achieve coexistence with grazing businesses without requiring lethal control.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 00:01
Welcome to the next episode of Animals and Us, where we explore and honour the awesomeness of animals and our relationships with them. Today's guest is Dr Julie Finnell, dingo advocate, ecologist, and passionate voice for Australia's wild heart. Julie's journey with dingoes began in 2013, not with admiration, but with curiosity. What followed was a transformative path of connection, discovery, and advocacy for one of Australia's most misunderstood understood animals. In this episode, we explore her personal and professional journey, the ecological importance of dingoes, the misconceptions that threaten them, and the glimmers of hope she sees through regenerative practices and coexistence. This is a story of heart, science, courage, and the call to protect this vital species. Hello Jules, welcome to Animals and Us.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 01:02
Thank you, um, pleasure to be here.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 01:04
We met back in 2013, so it's really great to catch up after 12 years.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 01:11
Yes, yes, it's been a bit of a, um, journey for both of us in that time, but, um, yeah, it's great to see you again.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 01:18
Yeah, you too, Julie. Before we start talking about dingoes, can you tell us about your childhood and what role animals played, if at all, in your childhood?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 01:28
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The relationships Dr Funnell built with King, Kalari, and Alira taught her that working with an animal's nature rather than trying to dominate it creates stronger bonds and better outcomes, a lesson that applies far beyond dingoes.
This conversation includes bush kid, cat person, dog-scared vet worker, the boot hits king, dingoes don't respond to dominance, the scale of culling she never knew, icon and outcast at once and the k'gari problem has no easy fix.
Yeah, absolutely. So I was lucky enough to grow up in the Blue Mountains in New South Wales. So, um, and at the back of our place was almost like endless bush. So, um, from a very young age, I was out in the bush. Absolutely loved going out in the bush as a kid and exploring and doing all those things. Um, and always, always as a kid, loved animals. Um, Got my first cat when I was 2. My dad found a guy about to drown a kitten down at the docks and took it off him and brought it home and got my first cat. And yeah, usually I've been involved with animals in some way or another ever since. Yeah, and actually my interest in that as well sort of led to an interest in wildlife photography and landscape photography as well, and There's a funny family story about when we went to the Northern Territory and I had my mum's little old box camera that you had to plug the flash into and turn it each time you took photos. And I was trying to photograph a perentie and I'm stalking this thing all the way and I'd take 3 steps and it'd take 3 steps. So I'd take 3 steps. So yes, always, always loved animals, been in the bush, interested in nature, all of it.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 02:41
Yeah, yeah. And in 2013, you had your first encounter with dingoes. Can you tell us about how dingoes entered your life?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 02:52
Yeah, so I'd actually worked at a— I'd come up to Townsville from Sydney, so I'd lived in Sydney for quite a long time, and I worked at a veterinary hospital there for 13 years. And I first started at the veterinary hospital working in the kennels, in their boarding kennels. And I really wanted the job, but I— what I didn't let on to them at the time was that I was scared of dogs because I've been— I've grown up with cats and my parents had often told me stories about people being attacked by dogs and to be careful. So I was actually quite nervous around dogs, and if we had something like a Rottweiler in boarding, I was freaking out. But over those years of working in the vet hospital and working with dogs all those years, I got much more comfortable with dogs. And then I came up here to Townsville to start a job at James Cook University, and I still wanted to work at a veterinary hospital, but none of the veterinary hospitals around here were like the ones in— the one that I worked at in Sydney, because it was a big 24-hour emergency vet hospital specialist, etc., etc. And I would work like after-hour shifts and things like that. So there wasn't any real equivalent in Townsville where I could find that they were willing to take anyone. And so with that, I sort of looked around and thought, well, I still want to work with animals. And I came across Billabong Sanctuary, which is our local wildlife park, and trotted along there and asked if I could become a volunteer. And they said yes. So I still remember my first day nearly killed me. It was in summer and it was extremely hot. Yeah, it was full on. But as part of what they did then is that they'd get the— while they did the dingo show, they'd get the volunteers to interact with the 3 dingoes just to, you know, have them up and moving while the show was on. And so my very first show that I did as a volunteer, I'm in the background just wanting to play with the dingoes. And I thought they were like dogs, you know, didn't know anything about them. And there was a boot there, an old boot. And I thought, oh, if I throw the boot, like the dingo will chase it and that'll look good for the crowd. So I threw the boot.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 05:00
Like a dingo would.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 05:01
Yeah, exactly. I threw the boot and King was the dingo that I threw it at, to what I thought was throwing it to, and he literally just watched it and it clocked him straight on the forehead. Oh no. Oh no, Jules. So it was not an auspicious start to our relationship. And meanwhile, I'm like going, did anyone in the crowd see that? But that was sort of my first Not the highlight of your career. No, no, no, no, you know, I'm glad no one caught it on film, put it that way. And so that was my first sort of inkling that maybe these animals weren't like your typical dog. And as I started to work more as a volunteer, I started to become really intrigued by the dingoes. And I could also see that they could really benefit from some training and additional walks and things like that. So I said to them, listen, do you mind if I have a crack at training the dingoes and doing some extra walks and everything? And they said to me, yep, that's fine, go for it. So I would come in on my own time, you know, before the park opened or after the park closed, and started working with the dingoes. And I've got to say, I brought in a lot of my— the old-fashioned way of doing dog training, which was the way I had learned from a decade or more previously. And working with the dingoes to show that that just wasn't going to work. Dingoes do not respond well to any sort of like, you know, I'm dominant and I'm in charge and you'll do what I say. Dingoes will just look at you and go, you're horrible. Why would I do anything with you? So, and that really then sparked my curiosity to, I thought if I'm gonna train these animals, I need to find out more about them. So I just started looking for more information on dingoes. And I guess you could say I fell down the rabbit hole and here I am all these years later, still passionate about dingoes. And yeah, it's sort of, you know, I was always passionate about animals and the environment, but not about one specifically. And this became my one specifically.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 07:13
So as you began learning, self-learning about dingoes, what were some of the first surprises that that you uncovered about dingoes? What surprised you as you grew your bank of knowledge about them?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 07:30
I guess how little I knew about them, and that sort of reflected how little most people knew about them. I just assumed that they were a kind of wild dog animal. You know, obviously heard about Azaria Chamberlain. Yeah, that was sort of the sum total really of my knowledge at that point. And so as I started to learn more about them and one, learn what extraordinary animals they actually are and the role that they play in our environment, but also two, I'd never realized the scale on which they are culled throughout the country. And yeah, that sort of, that was a real, really big realization and that we were still using things like poison, foothold traps, all of those things. I had never realized that that was happening.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 08:20
Hmm, yeah. How did that experience or how did that learning, the learnings and discoveries change the course of your work and change your direction professionally?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 08:34
Yeah, so I mean, in terms of what I did at Billabong, I actually became a full-time ranger at Billabong. And so very much the, like, the dingo talks that we did for the public and the interaction was very much geared towards trying to address a lot of those misunderstandings and, yeah, getting people to sort of see what I had seen and understand that while still presenting it in a way that's public-friendly. You can't go too hard on the doom and gloom. And it also actually gave me an opportunity to interact with all sorts of people because we are in a rural area up here. So I would have graziers approach me, and when I was out doing dingo walks and have a bit of a private chat, they always sort of wouldn't do it around other people, but they'd have a bit of a private chat around dingoes and their views on them. And predominantly those views were actually positive. Um, they were like, yeah, we leave them be, they do their thing, we do ours, they don't cause us much drama. Um, yeah, so in terms of how it changed my career, I went on to work in natural resource management up here in Queensland, and a lot of the work we do is with graziers. And so that gave me a lot better insight into the grazing industry and grazing management and land management and all those sorts of things, and a lot more contact with traditional owners from the region as well and their views and, you know, what their land management practices And it's also been an opportunity to sort of advocate in the NRM space for a conversation around dingoes. It's been a topic that generally people haven't wanted to discuss beyond how to do wild dog control. But there are people out there who use dingoes as part of the landscape to manage their landscape effectively and coexist with, you know, livestock and dingoes. And they don't do it because, you know, they love dingoes or anything like that. They do it because they see the benefits of it and what can be achieved, you know, for their grazing business through it. So yeah, that's been really great too as well to have a different aspect and different conversations. Yeah.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 10:49
And contribute to that coexistence. We'll come, I'll address that later on about the coexistence. You in the past have described dingoes as both an icon and an outcast. Can you— do you have an opinion about why dingoes provoke such a strong reaction in Australians?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 11:10
Yeah, it's an interesting one because when you see Australian wildlife represented, you know, posters and, you know, postcards and all that kind of thing, dingoes are often amongst the wildlife that are depicted there, along with your kangaroos, your emus, etc., etc. And then you've got, you know, the Azaria Chamberlain story, and more recently what happens on K'gari, formerly Fraser Island. And that forms— people see that and they form a really strong opinion about dingoes being dangerous and all of those kinds of things.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 11:43
That's very interesting. A lot of people associate dingoes with Fraser Island, or Kari, as it's known now. Can you give us some insight into the situation there with dingoes?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 11:55
Yeah, and it's, it's a real shame that a lot of the stories that are in the media about dingoes concentrate on Kari and what happens there. And that's the impression that a lot of people get about dingoes is from there, which sort of gives the impression that, you know, they're going to attack people and do all of these things. And what I would often say to people is think about all the stories you hear about dingoes attacking people and having those negative interactions. 95% of those probably occur on K'gari. And when you consider that dingoes are throughout mainland Australia, all throughout mainland Australia, and you're not hearing those same stories from throughout Australia with, you know, that kind of frequency, obviously there's something different going on there. And there's a long history on K'gari of people interacting with dingoes. And the rangers on K'gari have taken really strong steps to try and stop this from happening. There's signage everywhere about don't do it, there's big fines in place, many thousands of dollars, you know, rangers patrolling, all of those sorts of things to try and stop that interaction. Because once dingoes overcome their fear of people and start seeing them as something they can interact with, then you start to get these negative interactions. And young dingoes in particular will see if they can play with something and doesn't respond. And, you know, if a person starts— sorry— running and flapping their arms, then hey, cool response. Also, like, they got a reaction, like, cool, something happened. I tried it and something happened. You know, so And I mean, even to this day, even knowing all of this, people are still interacting with dingoes on K'gari. I actually had a conversation with someone back at Billabong, so it would have been about 3 years ago when I was walking the dingoes, and a gentleman approached me and we were talking about dingoes and he said, "Oh, you know, my son was playing with a dingo pup on the beach there." And I just couldn't believe it. And you know, one, what a dangerous situation for his son to be in, because if the parents of that pup had come back and seen that, they quite likely would have attacked. But two, socializing that dingo pup to be near people and to want to approach people, you know. And, and this was at a time when I know all the signage and everything was there. It wasn't 20 years ago. And so really disappointing to see that that message isn't getting through. And I think One of the other contributing factors is that dingoes are relatively small and they look like a dog and people just think they can interact with them like a dog. I mean, if you're in Africa and you saw a lion, you wouldn't be thinking, "I'm going to go and play with that or feed it or take a selfie with it." There might be some people who do. But generally people look at dingoes and they're kind of, yeah, they look like a smallish dog, you know, and I can interact with that. And so they do. And so this is how we get this situation occurring. And, you know, and definitely the number of people going over there and the tourism has expanded over there, which has led to even more of those interactions. And yeah, it's a difficult situation to resolve.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 15:09
Hmm. Can you see a solution?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 15:13
Not an easy one. I think The rangers are trying as hard as they can over there. I mean, I don't work there, I'm not over there, so, you know, but from what I see and hear, you know, they're taking a lot of active steps to try and discourage people from interacting with them and to inform them what to do if there is a potential of a negative interaction without adversely affecting the dingoes. But as long as there's people there that are willing to do that It's just going to keep happening, unfortunately. And because the pups learn from their parents, if their parents are doing that behavior, they're seeing that behavior, they're going to do the same behavior. So, you know, there have been some people who have called for all tourists to be removed from the island for the next 10 years, that kind of thing. I think that's unlikely. It would definitely contribute to solving the problem, but it's, you know, there's too many people who rely on it for their income and everything. But finding a way to keep people away from dingoes and vice versa without negatively affecting dingoes, um, yeah, that, that will be the solution. But it's also a very big challenge. Yeah, I guess one of the other views, and this comes around— there's a background to this reaction that some landholders, some graziers, hate them with a passion.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 16:38
Yeah.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 16:38
And I understand that because, you know, if you've seen a sheep that's been mauled and it's badly hurt and it's still alive, you know, that's horrific. And to have to go and shoot your own livestock and everything, I don't think we should ever underestimate the impact of that on people. And I completely understand why you would resent the animal that did that to your livestock. Um, but a lot of our attitudes come from the fact that we were European farmers to begin with, and we brought those European ways of farming Australia. And in that, we've also lost some of the traditional methods that were used in Europe, like livestock guardian animals. But also, people used to be shepherds. They used to stay with their animals all the time to protect them because obviously they have wolves and things like that. Um, whereas in Australia, you know, some— in some areas they just go out, you know, and in some areas you're using helicopters to muster animals because they're out so far in the bush. So yeah, I think part of that is because we brought with us the European idea that predators are bad and you must get rid of them. And when you look at a lot of Europe, that was the approach that's taken, which is why now wolves are extinct in a lot of their former areas, etc. So I think there's sort of a legacy of how agriculture was established here. But also, you know, that very visceral reaction that people have to seeing animals hurt or mauled by an animal, that they resent that animal, and that's a perfectly natural reaction.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 18:19
And in Australia, I know you have worked with the policy of wild dog control. Can you tell us about what the wild dog control is all about and why it may be dangerous to dingoes?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 18:36
Yeah, so there's a bit of an illusion out there that there's two types of animals. You've got dingoes and you've got wild dogs. And the wild dogs are the ones that cause all the problems and, you know, need to be removed. They're these savage, vicious creatures, you know, whereas, and dingo, that's not a dingo. You know, and that's something that's been sort of perpetuated for many decades now. And so yeah, you'll often hear the term wild dog control, which means lethal control. What people don't realise is that the majority of the animals being targeted by that lethal control are dingoes. So dingoes basically got rebranded as wild dogs and nothing ever really changed. And the work by Kylie Cairns at University of New South Wales has shown— she's done genetic testing from dingoes all over Australia and it shows that like the vast majority of dingoes are either completely pure or high percentage dingo. The number of animals out there that are either low percentage dingo or just no dingo genes at all is very, very low. Right.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 19:44
Can you take us back genetically to the origin of dingoes? Because there is that confusion between wild dogs, dogs, and dingoes, and the origin of dingoes?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 19:57
Yeah, so the best information we have so far is that they originated somewhere in southern Asia, likely around what's modern-day China, and started moving south. And as they moved south, they moved to all the land masses that are between us and Asia. And at some point they've come to Australia, and we We don't know exactly how. The most common sort of accepted theory is that people traveling down from Indonesia brought them with them and deposited them in Northern Australia and they went from there. To be fair though, we don't know that that was actually the case. We don't actually know exactly how long they've been here. The oldest skeletal remains found were about 3,500 years old, but the genetic work indicates that it could be a lot longer than that. So the truth is we just don't know how and when they got here. We know it was likely less than, sort of say, 15,000 years, based on the fact that there's no dingoes in Tasmania, and we know Tasmania and the mainland separated about 12,000 years ago. But in all honesty, we really can't say for certain how long they've been here. And we do know that they've been isolated in Australia for thousands of years as Australia moved away from all the other land masses. Dingoes became isolated and their closest genetic relative is the Papua New Guinea Singing Dog, which when you think about it makes sense because Australia and Papua New Guinea were closer together. And if they were spreading south, Papua New Guinea would have been the next and final stop before Australia. So yeah, their closest genetic relative is the Papua New Guinea Singing Dog. And that when you do a genetic analysis of dingo genes and domestic dog genes, dingoes are very clearly separated out from domestic dogs.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 21:46
Right, you're right. I think in a previous chat that you and I have had, you said that dingoes remind you a bit more like cats in their behaviour.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 21:56
Yeah, so sometimes people call them cats in a dog's body, and I've heard them called cats in a dog's body with a monkey's brain. Yeah, so dingoes, because they're not a domesticated animal, they're a bit more like cats in that they're very independent. They do not naturally obey people or anything like that. So whereas dogs are sort of being bred to respond to people and will tend to see a person and be like, oh, good, a human, and, you know, respond positively to that. And dogs actually look at us, particularly like working breeds. I mean, you would have worked with Kelpies and everything. They look at you like, they're like, what's happening? What's next? What do you want me to do? Yeah, dingoes will never look at you to find out that information. They're doing their own thing, like, don't care what you, what you want, I'm gonna do my thing. Um, so yeah, and they're, I guess they're more like cats like that, but also to, you know, with cats don't easily form trusting relationships with people often, it takes a while to establish trust, and it's the same with dingoes because they're quite a wary animal because you have to be to survive. So, um, yeah, they're, they're, they can be sort of perceived as quite aloof and those kinds of things, but it's really just one, they've never been domesticated to want to be around people, and two, they're naturally wary.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 23:17
You used a term the other day when we were chatting, neophobic.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 23:21
Yes.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 23:22
Tell us about that, neophobic.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 23:24
Yeah, so neo meaning new and phobic obviously meaning, you know, scared of. So yeah, dingoes are quite, they're very cautious animals. Having said that, it does depend on their personality too. Every animal has its own personality. So, you know, one of my dingoes was like, "Eh, everything's gonna kill me," and one that would just literally put their face in anything they came across to see what was in it. So yeah, and they've found the same sort of characteristics in wolves and all sorts of things. But yeah, dingoes are quite suspicious of anything new in their environment, and they'll develop a phobia really quickly from things. So like if they were standing, let's just say they were standing near a red ute and suddenly someone dumped something in the back of the ute and made a loud bang that startled them, they'll associate the ute with that scary incident and then they'll be very, very paranoid about that ute. Um, and it takes you a long time to try and get them past that phobia. Um, because in the wild if you have a scary experience you don't go back and repeat it because you could die. So yeah, they're very cautious that way.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 24:32
Thank you. And what role have Indigenous perspectives or relationships with dingoes played in your own understanding of dingoes and how we should be treating them?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 24:44
Yeah, no, it's been an interesting sort of journey for me. And I wouldn't speak on behalf of traditional owners, that's not my place. And I guess one thing that's become apparent too is, you know, there's so many different groups of traditional owners throughout Australia that all have their own law, customs, everything else. So that there is no blanket statement to be made about, oh, this is what dingoes mean, and etc., etc. So, um, but I've been lucky enough to be involved with dingo culture, um, and through that, the First Nations inaugural Dingo Forum. And just to be present at this really historic event that had Traditional Owners from all over Australia coming together to talk specifically about dingoes and how they would like to see dingoes managed on Country. Yeah, very real honour, very humbling. And just, yeah, really interesting because, you know, the way dingoes are regarded, they see, as they see everything as part of the landscape. It's all connected. Not one thing is separate. Not one thing is, you know, good, bad, this, that. It's all part of it. And they manage the land and everything with it that way. And so, yeah, from the conversations I've had, it's very much that perspective of them being part of the landscape and the natural functioning of the landscape. Yeah, that holistic perspective. Perspective.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 26:13
Yeah, and therefore very important, very, very important in Australia's ecosystem.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 26:19
Yeah, yeah. And for some groups, they are, you know, a totem animal. Yeah.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 26:26
Um, Jules, how is working so closely with dingoes affected you personally? You've shared how it's affected you professionally. How has it changed your or shaped your life personally?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 26:40
It's sort of hard to put into words, to be honest. Um, it's been a hard journey at times, but one I would never ever have not gone through. Um, yeah, working with dingoes changed my perspectives on a lot of things. Um, and as I sort of said at the beginning, my training methods were totally outdated, and through training the dingoes, I would now approach training any animal completely differently. You know, and they understand it's about the relationship and about you being a safe place. Yeah, and understanding what's going on for them and learning their language and being able to speak their language. And yeah, and it was just, I mean, it's anyone who's had a really strong bond with an animal knows what that's like and how special it is. And You know, and I like, I would go in a lot of my own time to spend with the dingoes. And when King and Kalari died, it left Alira by herself. So I ended up going in every day to be with her because she missed her pack, and I was sort of the last of her pack in a way. And people go, oh, you know, I really admire your dedication and everything, and I just I never really saw it as dedication. I just, it was always what I wanted to do. Um, seeing her was the best part of my day, you know. I loved being with her. So yeah, it's, it's, and it's been a different relationship to the ones that I've had with various pets and things like that because they were working dingoes. They, they were in a zoo. Um, they needed to do shows and, you know, and when I say shows, I don't mean performances like you spoke about them and do public walks and get patted and everything like that. So yeah, while it was a personal relationship, it was also a working relationship with them. And, you know, I just, I was always so proud of them, so proud of them that the way they dealt with things, you know, like a toddler suddenly grabbing their fur and pulling it and everything, and they never showed a skerrick of aggression towards anyone you know. Um, yeah, yeah. And to see people have that interaction, and you could see like, wow, I'm patting a dingo and the dingo is lovely, and they're starting to overcome a lot of their sort of misperceptions about them and have this positive experience. Um, you know, and to, to have my dingoes be the one that's doing that, that was, yeah, wonderful. Yeah.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 29:15
So would you describe them as, as being your mates? When you had the—
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 29:19
Absolutely.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 29:19
Working and relationship with those 3 dingoes. Yeah. They were your mates. Yeah.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 29:25
And I mean, anyone who's got a relationship with a working animal where it's both a personal relationship and a working relationship, it's— in a way, it's almost a stronger relationship because you, you know, you have your personal time and, you know, and I'd love going in and spending time with them outside of park hours so we could just be together as ourselves and we'd go for big walks and do all of that. But also to work with them and to be doing it in a professional capacity. Yeah, both were very rewarding and wouldn't give it up for the world.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 29:59
Yeah, wonderful, wonderful, rich experience. Were there any unforgettable moments? Like you mentioned little toddlers coming up and grabbing the fur of the dingo. And are there any other moments that you just find very rich and unforgettable that you, you've had with dingoes?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 30:19
Um, probably two that spring to mind just straight up. Um, the first one is again another demonstration of how good the dingoes were at their jobs. And, and yeah, so we were standing there once, we'd been doing a show, I had a couple of dingoes on the lead and a woman tripped and fell. Wasn't her fault, tripped, and as she fell, she sort of grabbed the nearest thing to her, which was Kulari's hindquarters, and sort of almost like slammed her hindquarters to the ground as she fell, which wasn't her fault. She was, you know, obviously just falling. And poor Kulari got such a fright, as you can imagine. She didn't see it happening, and suddenly her hindquarters are being slammed to the ground, and she sort of like almost let out a little growl and spun around in surprise. And then that was it, you know. She never went to bite or nip or do anything. She was just sort of like, ah, what happened? Oh, okay, everything's all right.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 31:13
And yeah, I'm safe.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 31:16
It was amazing to see how good they were at doing that. And I guess another one that just demonstrates the trust that we had, um, so I was out walking the dingoes out the back of the park. Um, there's actually a creek and a section of bush out there, so we'd go out there and We have a horrible weed up here that has these really sharp little spines all over it and it rips you up and the spines stick in you and then they break off and get embedded and it's horrible. And Alira managed to walk past a branch of that and get the spines embedded in her fur and her skin. And she just waited patiently and let me pick each of them out. She didn't panic. She didn't try and get them out herself. She just knew that like just by standing there that I would get them out and everything, which for a dingo, that, that's a big deal because dingoes will always sort of trust themselves over you. So yeah, to, to have her let me do that and to trust me to do that, um, yeah, it was just sort of a real demonstration of the relationship we had.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 32:19
Yeah, you must have shown deep, deep trust in that, in that act. Jules, what have dingoes taught you about nature and balance, or perhaps even being human.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 32:31
Even though my undergraduate degree was environmental biology and I sort of, I thought I understand how ecology worked and all of that kind of thing, understanding dingoes and their role in the environment and how that all works and to what level they are interconnected with everything else. It's not just the fact that they, you know, prey on kangaroos or do things like that, the impact of what they predate on sort of goes out through the ecosystem and can change the vegetation, even the soil. So that interconnectedness and the health of the environment when everything's working as it should. And also too, the fact that that's achievable on grazing properties. You know, we tend to have this attitude that farming's over here, the environment's over here, they're not compatible. That's not the case at all. And, you know, grazing properties are such a huge proportion of Australia that, you know, that we can't sort of take that attitude. Yeah, that's been a really important sort of lesson for me in that area. But also about being human, I guess it's more going back to what Traditional Owners already know and have been trying to tell us for a long time about working with the environment. Stop trying to fight it. Stop trying to dominate it and subdue it and make it do what you want it to do. And understand the nature of it and how you can work with it. And it's, it's amazing what can be achieved when you do that. About, you can have absolutely a thriving grazing business and be working with the environment in doing that. Um, it It's not either or, it doesn't have to be either or.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 34:23
Jules, you've mentioned before that you believe that dingoes are vital ecosystem regulators. What do you think it's going to take for us to get there?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 34:34
There's a couple of things. Obviously, a lot of the culling that occurs is in agricultural areas. And as we know, change in agricultural practice It takes a long time for things to change. But I understand why, because, you know, it's very easy for us to sit here and go, "You should do this, you should do that." For graziers, this is their livelihood. This is their income, you know, their property, all of those things. So they need to be able to see it play out in a local context. And to be able to see that yes, it does work to do it a different way. It can be achieved and actually you can get better results this way. So I think that's—
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 35:22
Elaborate more on that, on how that coexistence will actually work.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 35:27
Yeah, yeah. So I guess there's two different aspects here because there's cattle and then there's sheep and how dingoes work with both is very different. And around cattle, A lot of people— well, quite a few graziers have found that just leaving dingoes alone to form stable packs and also how they manage their cattle can have a really big impact on whether the cattle— whether the dingoes predate on cattle. Generally, it's the biting of the calves that's the big issue generally with cattle because they mightn't be able to like that. Well, it would be very difficult for dingoes to bring down a full 500-kilo adult cow, so it'll be generally the calves they go after. But they'll go after the calves when they're unprotected by the cows. So some of the husbandry stuff around that, but also letting those dingo packs stabilize and let— so they'll keep out other dingoes. So what often happens after people do a big round of baiting, for example, and kill out most of the resident dingoes, they'll often say, "Oh, but we saw an influx, we saw heaps more dingoes after we baited." And that's because they've opened up the territory and now every dingo in the area that's looking for territory is coming into that vacant spot to try and set up a territory. But what we also know from the research is that dingo packs that are fractured through things like baiting, they often form like a teenage gang. It's like kids that don't have proper parental supervision, they've been traumatized, they all hang out together and do naughty things. Um, that's sort of what forms in the aftermath of that, and they're the ones that do a lot of the damage. Um, whereas if the dingo packs just settle and the adults teach the kids what the right thing to do is and what to hunt and how to hunt it, a lot of that can be resolved just by letting all of that stabilise. And of course, you know, dingoes being predators will prey on particularly macropods— your kangaroos and wallabies— and even goats. They quite like goats, feral goats. So they'll help regulate that grazing pressure on the landscape as well, and feral deer too. So they can help regulate the grazing pressure because at the end of the day, if you're running cattle, what you want is grass. So to be able to mitigate the grazing pressure from things like kangaroos also contributes to the business. Plus just the, you know, the stress of having to go out and kill animals. I don't know any landholders that enjoy doing it. Sometimes it's quite a significant time and cost commitment, you know, and so to be able to save on that but still know your cattle will be okay. Yeah, that's a big thing. And obviously there's things like guardian animals as well that can be used to help with any threat of predation. Sheep, as I said, is a bit different. Dingoes will go after sheep. They're a much more smaller animal, easier to bring down. But also dingoes struggle to actually eat sheep because the meat's so fatty and they can't actually digest it very well. And so they'll often just go for parts of the sheep. And so that's why you'll often see people go, "They killed the whole sheep, but they've only eaten part of it." It's because it was the parts that they could eat. And also sheep tend to like flock together and then sort of churn in this panicked mass, which for a predator is, you know, just far too exciting. They just start biting at everything. So in those instances, what's really been found to work is livestock guardian animals. As protectors for those animals. So people have significantly reduced their losses to predation by having things like Maremma sheepdogs out there protecting their flocks.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 39:21
Hmm, that's wonderful. So I imagine you have seen these models, these grazing models, these properties that have success stories with dingoes.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 39:31
Some of them, I mean, a lot of them have come through contacts and stories and all of those kind of things. There's been research done on this. Obviously, you and I know Angus and his example. Evelyn Downs in South Australia was another property that did a big trial on this. But there's lots of people doing it just under the radar, I would say. It's a difficult topic to talk about. And so I think that's the next thing that will help move the needle on this. Is being able to discuss it. Because at the moment, it can be quite a taboo topic for people, particularly for graziers, to say in front of their neighbours that they're not doing wild dog control. It's perceived very negatively. And so, yeah, there is. And a lot of the people— well, the people that I've spoken to that don't actively undertake dingo control also don't say that publicly, um, because of the perceptions and everything. So yeah, and it's just a space where we need to start having the conversation. But I do feel hopeful, um, in that, you know, I work in natural resource management, so agricultural practices are— is a big part of that. Um, and, you know, practices in regenerative agriculture that 20 years ago would have just been seen as you know, hippie crap, are becoming more mainstream. And people are becoming more open to change. They can see that what has been done isn't working anymore. And they're more open to solutions, finding solutions because they want to keep these properties going. They want them to be good businesses. You know, they want to be good stewards of the land. So they're open to looking at other solutions.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 41:24
Good, so you have quite a few reasons for hope for the future of dingoes.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 41:30
Yeah, and I guess another one too is that traditional owners starting to really find their voice around this and express it and, you know, not always successful in being listened to, but I think that will happen more and more that as they as they indicate that they want to have a voice in how dingoes are managed in Australia, hopefully that will start to be taken on board as well.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 41:57
Yeah. And Jules, what is your greatest fear about dingoes and the future of dingoes?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 42:07
I guess really that they go the way of the thylacine.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 42:10
Tasmanian tiger.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 42:12
Tasmanian tiger, yeah, exactly. You know, that by the time things come in to protect them, that they're extinct. And I don't think that we'll get to the point where dingoes are extinct extinct, but they could be what they call functionally extinct— there's not enough genetics and individuals left— or that dingoes will just be relegated to very remote areas and that's the only ones we sort of have and keep and yeah, they become yet another native animal that's only found in remote areas and that kind of thing. And, um, you know, and there is the threat of hybridization with domestic dogs. It doesn't happen as much as people thought it had, but as packs get fragmented and everything, that risk does rise. Um, so yeah, I just, I worry that they'll end up being Just, yeah, in areas where that it doesn't matter where they are. Um, yeah.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 43:17
Jules, for someone who has had intimate experience with, with dingoes and knows the subject well, what if dingoes could speak? What do you think they would want to say to humans?
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 43:32
Please don't hate us. Please don't hate us, just let us live our lives. We don't want to interact with you. We're not trying to do the wrong thing. You know, we were here for thousands of years and then our environment changed around us and we've tried to adapt to that. You know, just understand us, work with us. Yeah.
Natalie Stockdale (Host) · 43:56
Okay. Well, thank you very much, Jules. Appreciate your time. Thanks for helping to debunk some of the myths around dingoes and being a voice for them.
Dr Julie Funnell (Guest) · 44:09
Thank you. Thank you. Follow the sun. Animals and Us is a production of Kintsugi Heroes. Thank you to Xavier Rudd for his permission to use Follow the Sun as our theme music for this series. If you enjoyed this conversation, share the podcast with a friend and let us know by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you'd like to support Kintsugi Heroes and the stories we share, head to Kintsugiheroes.com.au and follow the instructions to make a tax-deductible donation. Thank you for listening, and we'll See you next time. Brand new moon, brand new sun.
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