How YOU Can Help Wild Dogs Multiply!

If you’ve dreamed about becoming a wild dog or conservation hero, this may be your shot to make a real difference!

South Africa (10 February 2026) – Thanks to the Endangered Wildlife Trust, 24 African wild dogs are ready to move into new protected homes over the next year. From there, they’ll form new packs, and in time, new pups can be born.

The Wild Dog Range Expansion Project focuses on expanding safe, suitable habitat for one of Africa’s second-most endangered carnivores. The aim lies beyond just protecting what remains of African wild dog populations by focusing on creating conditions for new packs to thrive, too.

African wild dogs are incredibly special animals. They’re highly social, intelligent and deeply bonded, and rely entirely on their packs. They hunt together, raise pups together and survive together.

As EWT expert and project coordinator Cole du Plessis puts it, “They live and die for their pack.”

Sadly, the species faces an ongoing pressure. Habitat loss, rising conflict with people, disease and snaring all continue to limit where packs can safely exist. Today, fewer than 6,600 African wild dogs remain in the wild, and they’ve disappeared from more than half the countries they once roamed.

One of the biggest challenges isn’t behaviour or biology, it’s space.

This is where the good news comes in…

Rather than just holding the line in existing reserves, the Wild Dog Range Expansion Project works to identify new protected areas that can support additional packs. Each potential site is put through a feasibility study, looking at factors like size, prey availability, predator numbers, disease history and long-term protection.

“We have found about 13 protected areas across Africa that meet these initial feasibility requirements. Cumulatively, these reserves account for over 3 million hectares of safe space into which African wild dogs can be reintroduced.” shares Cole.

That’s one leg of the work. The other is in helping wild dogs multiply.

The EWT does this by carefully selecting and bonding new packs, often by introducing males from one pack and females from another. This mediated process takes time and expert oversight, but it’s essential for forming stable packs with strong genetics. These efforts help significantly in improving long-term survival.

It’s work that could save a species, but conservationists can’t make it happen without substantial funding.

Site assessments, veterinary care, vaccinations, specialist translocation, temporary holding and long-term monitoring all form part of the process. That’s why the EWT is calling on the public, businesses and partners to help sponsor these packs and support their journey to new homes.

Any donation, whether it’s R100 or R2000, helps the project closer toward its overall R3,000,000 goal. The funding will go toward rehoming 24 protected African wild dogs over the course of the next year.

“The success and failures in our conservation efforts don’t just affect conservationists, but humanity as a whole. We need to reintegrate nature into our DNA. and undertake restoration efforts to repair the damage rather than just preserve what is left. There’s a rare and exciting opportunity to restore the African wild dog populations of the past and make a significant conservation impact in saving the species. But we need to act now.” says Cole.

Click here to donate.

Sources: Linked above.

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