The proud owner of dingo Kimba, James Bornstein, is part of the new wave of Australian exotic pet lovers whose unconventional companions are growing in popularity.
In a country known for its unusual wildlife, Bornstein says having a sub-species of the gray wolf in his Sydney home is an opportunity to change people’s negative perceptions about the native wild dog and apex predator.
“Dingoes are so intelligent. We want people to see her [Kimba] and realize they are not vicious animals, they are just like normal dogs,” he told reporters.
Photo: AFP
Dingoes are infamous thanks to the dramatic case of Azaria Chamberlain — a nine-week-old baby apparently snatched by one of the animals during a camping trip in central Australia in 1980, which was made into a movie.
Bornstein hopes his efforts will increase support for conservation, as dingo numbers decline amid habitat loss and cross-breeding with domestic dogs.
His views are echoed by Ben Dessen, reptile manager at Kellyville Pets store in Sydney, who owned his first snake at age six.
“Now we see every six-year-old that we set up with their first reptile — hopefully they want to go on and protect animals and have an appreciation for how amazing these creatures are,” he said.
According to the Australian Veterinary Association, exotic pets are becoming “more and more popular,” with residents owning millions of birds, fish, small mammals and reptiles.
Ernie Chan, a breeder who has kept up to 130 reptiles, says shrinking homes and urbanization have seen potential owners turn to smaller pets that require less maintenance.
“You don’t need to take a snake for a walk,” Chan says. “Everybody’s had dogs and cats for so many years and it’s kind of reptiles’ time to shine.”
Brooke Winters is another exotic-pet convert in a nation famous for koalas, kangaroos and wombats.
“I grew up with Steve Irwin as my idol, so pretty much everything that he did I just wanted to mimic,” Winters said at Macarthur Pets, a large pet store in Sydney that she manages. “I just feel like people don’t appreciate [reptiles] enough and treat them very differently just because they don’t have fur.”
“Crocodile Hunter” Irwin was a world-renowned conservationist whose stunts with dangerous animals drew attention to wildlife Down Under before his death a decade ago.
Despite their growing popularity, there are strict laws across Australia governing what exotic creatures can be kept as pets.
Welfare officials warned of buying an animal that might have been grabbed from the wild.
“Those animals can have really special needs and even if they have been bred in captivity, they are generally wild animals with long histories of living in particular environments,” RSPCA Australia’s Jane Speechley said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing