Author Gary Taylor ◦
Beautiful Bobby, Rest in Peace ol’ mate… And this is not a post of sadness, it’s about celebrating a long and wonderful life 🙂
Dumped at the door of a wildlife park near Geraldton in a cardboard box with his siblings, only weeks old, too young to survive without help, just a note saying “found in cave near Wiluna”, DNA tested and found to be 100% pure, we’ll never know his past… Were his parents shot? Poisoned? Dunno… but what I do know is at that point his chances of survival (let alone living a great life) would normally have been fairly low. But the girls at the park did an awesome job of keeping them alive and Tony (who’d often helped with volunteer work at the park) had the space for a huge enclosure and agreed to take on a pup. But at this stage I hadn’t met him yet… 😃
Then one day, shopping at my local IGA, this bloke comes up to me and says “excuse me mate, is that your dingo on the back of the old Landcruiser in the parking lot?” 😃
😆😂 He spoke so quietly I damn near shit, I knew it was leading somewhere, had she just done a “happy dance” on the roof of his brand new Landcruiser? Wouldn’t be the first time… “Oh what a feeling…” 😆 First thought was “what makes you think it’s mine?…” (Done that once before too… Nah, not mine mate, yeah fuckin’ dingoes are bad around here…” 😂)
I looked around the shop like “of all the people here, why assume it’s me?” Nyeh, could be ‘cos I’m the only one in khaki shorts, khaki shirt and a khaki hat… 😅 So I admitted guilt and said “ohhh… what’s she done now…”
🤣He gave a bit of a laugh with an “ok… that’s already a bit of an insight…” sort of tone and said “Nah, nothin’… I’ve just got a dingo pup, I was wondering if you could tell me what to expect…” 😆
So after shopping, and the relief of knowing Donk hadn’t danced on his roof or was playing keepy off with his child’s favourite toy (again, wouldn’t be the first time… but hey, I bet that child never waved his favourite teddy bear in front of a dingo ever again… 😂) we met up in the parking lot for a bit of a chat.
Bobby was barely a couple of months old, when I first put out my hand out to him he had a growl and a snap at me and then Donk growled back telling him to pull his head in…
Anyway, I told Tony which beach we hung out at and said he’d be welcome anytime… and he’d pop in now and then without Bobby and just watch Donk running free… “I’ve heard you can’t let them off a lead… They have no recall… An Indigenous fella once told me that no matter how much you love them when they reach two years old they’re gone…” 🙂 Yeah, old Indigenous mate of mine said the same when I first got Donk too… she’s five now…
But another concern was Donks growl at him, “Nah mate, she was just tellin’ the pup what the pack structure is, he’ll be fine, Donk will look after him…”.
It took a bit of convincing but when Bobby was nearly a year old Tony brought him to the beach and reluctantly let him free to play with Donk…
4th pic is that encounter, Donk, on the right about six years old… That initial interaction was awesome, they hit it off instantly, Donk took him under her wing like a family member and just seemed to want to teach him how to be a dingo… How to run hard, play hard, cop the knocks, and at times it looked pretty full on (when I first started posting pics of them playing together I was actually accused of setting up dog fights and called “an evil person” 😂) but they were best mates, like Bonnie and Clyde, only better, ‘cos they never got caught… 😆
They had an awesome life together, but the one thing they couldn’t do was raise their own pup, pass on their knowledge and skills…
Then Lupes came along, and although Bobby wasn’t expecting the sudden change in life he took to it fairly well, copping her ankle bites and cheeky behaviour (he really was such a beautiful soul) 😇 Then when Donk joined her spirit ancestors Bobby took on the role of Mentor to Lupes and continued her training… and he did an awesome job, she loved him to bits… 🥰
15 years of wonderful life… learning, growing, loving, sharing, teaching… Hang a left just over the bridge Bobby, put your nose up, you’ll smell the ocean, head for the coast, Donk is waiting for you at the never ending beach, run free ol’ mate… 💕
Photographs © Gary Taylor