The African wild dog is known to be a highly social animal. Pack sizes range from just a few animals to upwards of 30 dogs in the most successful packs. However, at Mombo camp, deep in Botswana’s Okavango Delta, one wild dog is living a very different lifestyle.
This particular female dog was part of a pack of three that were seen fairly regularly in the camp’s game-drive area. Sometime in August 2008 the two male dogs in the pack disappeared, leaving this female dog all alone. At first she would spend hours calling for her missing pack mates, but after some months she gave up, and we assumed she would wander further afield in search of new mates.
This didn’t happen, and in the early part of 2009, the lone female dog was observed greeting and touching muzzles with spotted hyaenas. As if this wasn’t unusual enough, the wild dog began associating herself with several family groups of black-backed jackals. Mombo guides Peter Myburgh and Simon Byron recounted how they had watched the wild dog coming to the jackal’s den site, where she would call to the pups that were hidden underground. When the pups responded and came out of the den, the wild dog regurgitated meat for them (both wild dogs and jackals feed their young by this method). Initially the adult jackals tried to chase off the wild dog by biting and attacking her, but once the dog started feeding the pups, the jackals accepted her.
Wild dogs and jackals are normally competitive and intolerant of one another – wild dogs have even been recorded killing jackals.
Black-backed jackal headdress. Source.
Black-backed jackal fur. Source.
The Anput headdress (pictured above) recently went to her new home a couple of weeks ago. I was fortunate enough to get to deliver her by hand when I was in California, and to see how well she was received. I even got to see the temple that would be her new home. She’s no longer in my home, but I have that memory, and the photos we took of her when I first completed her.
And, of course, there is Anput herself, who never leaves. She watches over my work with the skin spirits and sacred remains, and I am fortunate to have her in my home.
This is a custom necklace, so it’s already spoken for, but let me know if you’d like a similar one!
Real black-backed jackal hide with a hand-painted coyote tooth on a hand-braided black artificial sinew cord. Accented with black glass crow beads, four of which have been painted with gold acrylics. Cord is adjustable.
Just FYI, I had a few people ask me about the cost for making another one of these. I do have everything I need to make several more of these, and since a lot of this is done by hand (painting, braiding) instead of manufactured, let’s say $22 plus shipping ($5.35 for priority).
This is a custom necklace, so it’s already spoken for, but let me know if you’d like a similar one!
Real black-backed jackal hide with a hand-painted coyote tooth on a hand-braided black artificial sinew cord. Accented with black glass crow beads, four of which have been painted with gold acrylics. Cord is adjustable.
