The experts “amazed” to the survival of the miniature dachshund on the escape on the island of South Australia for more than a year | Southern Australia

A miniature dachshund disappeared 16 months ago on the island of Kangaroo in Southern Australia It has been identified alive and well – but continues to evade a team of voluntary researchers and wildlife experts who claim to be “amazed” that the dog has survived for so long in nature.

Valerie weighed less than 4 kg, had a pink collar and “would never have left (the) side” of its owner, Georgia Gardner, before disappearing in November 2023.

Gardner said that she and her partner, Josh Fishlock, from Albury in the new South Wales, were going on vacation on the island, famous for his native wild wildlife, when Valerie fled from his pen in their campsite at Stokes Bay before embarking on the scrub.

Despite the initial sightings and the couple looking for a week with the help of the premises of the island of Kangaroo, Valerie has not been seen anymore – until the last few months.

About a year after he disappeared for the first time, the couple heard through the social media that Valerie had been spotted on the island. Kangala Wildlife Rescue therefore voluntarily offered its services looking for Valerie.

“Based on first hand account and video tests we now know that Valerie is alive,” wrote Kangala Wildlife Rescue on his Facebook page last week. “It runs to the first sign of humans or vehicles and despite the best efforts of the dedicated island premises, Valerie was impossible to capture.”

The dog was last seen 15 km from where he disappeared, according to the organization.

Now he has created and is monitoring a series of traps set with the cameras in an attempt to convince the little dog from a very large research area, said Gardner to Guardian Australia.

He said she and Fishlock were incredulous when the news was given that Valerie had been identified in life.

“It was so crazy. Even with the really recent sightings, we were both like” No, not hope “.” he said.

“But, especially with the photograph that we have been sent and with the trust in saving Kangala’s wildlife, now we are just starting to block more like, ‘Ok, how will we arrive on the island if we have to take it?'”

Valerie’s apparent survival skills were “incredible” – and unexpected – he said.

“We thought, instead of surviving in the wild, perhaps someone had adopted it or she was going around with other dogs and getting their food, because it was a small absolute princess.

“He never left my side. He was not a very external and approximate dog. Think that he would even go out a night out in the rain, oh my God. Think that a year and a half went away is incredible.”

A director of Kangala, Jared Karran, told the Edelaide Advertist that was “amazed” that Valerie had survived the desert and suspected of having lived with a Roadkill and Dam diet.

Some experts suggested that Valerie may have received help from people on the island, but Paul McGreevy of the Veterinary School of the University of Sydney said that Batshunds, like all dogs, were “extremely enterprising”.

“Dogs are the biggest opportunists in the animal kingdom: this is one of their fundamental skills,” he said.

To survive, Valerie needed water, shelter in winter and food, he said.

Although not adapted to the Australian bush, the mini jars were willing to find food on the ground, McGreevy said.

“Hy hypothetically, birds, frogs and mice could eat, but it is more likely to eat carrion. And unfortunately, the reality is that dogs are opportunistic and will eat faecal material.

“If a human being had kept Valerie alive, why had they not noticed that he wore a pink collar and therefore had probably been missing from someone?”

In Australia, the vast majority of “wild dogs” they are actually native dingos or dingo hybrids. It is estimated that the control of wild dogs Costa to the economy $ 302 million per year.