CHASED BY DINGOES

Shannon News, 10 September 1926, Page 3

CHASED BY DINGOES

* ON ROUGH BUSH TRACK. WILD MOONLIGHT RIDE. SYDNEY, Sept. 7. One of the strangest stories that have been told of the bush in thesa modern days comes from the town of Lismore, one of the most prosperous centres on the fertile North Coast of. New South Wales. It concerns a chase after a well-known farmer, who was driving a motor-car, by a fierce pack of wild dingoes. The dingo is one of the few marauders Australia possesses. Fierce native dogs, they confine their ravaging mostly to defenceless, weaker, animals, taking immense tolls of sheep and young cattle, especially in the far west of this State and in parts of Queensland and South Australia, where the very size of the stations prevent proper safeguards, such as wire-netting the runs, to be taiken against them. In the more settled parts of the country, the advances of the white man has driven them to the barren mountain tops and tangled valleys, if it has not eradicated them", although reports from the north coast lately have indicated that, they are once more on the increase.

The farmer who met with tho strange adventure with these dingoes Is a well-known member of the Primary Producers' Union, an organisation of farmers, and he had been attending a meeting of a branch of the organisation abput twenty miles from his own home. The business of the meeting lasting longer than he thought it would, he found that he would have to make the journey back along a rough bush track by moonlight or stay the night at a friend's place. Possessing a motor-car, ha thought the journey be little trouble, and he chose to go to hft own home. The road led through dense bush. He topped a rise in th<* rough road, and was speeding through a clear patch when he observed strange forms slinking in the shadows, and two or thre ran across the road in the glare of his headlights. Suddenly he found himself in the midst of a pack of dingoes, led as far as the motorist couki determine, by a half-bred dog. - Fiercely leaping at the car, the pack gave chase and kept up with their quarry, the more venturesome of the dogs now and again leaping at the car. The driver at first teased the animals by alternately increasing a.v; slackening speed,. but f aarirg that his car might stall, and becoming alarmed at the dingoes' ferocity and perseverance, he increased the speed of the car. The faster he went ,the faster went the dingoes. They were never further than a few yards behind him. Then, despite the roughness of the track, the farmer decided to send his car along at the best speed it could attainV and it was only then, after the dingoes had chased the car - ' several more miles, that they gave up tho hunt ,the last to relinquish pursuit being the huge leader. The pack is stated to be the terror of the whole nighbourhood, and more than a dozen forays have been made against it by armed men and dogs without success. It has done' much damage to stock, taking young colves, sheep, ducks, and fowls. Its leader, unequalled in cunning, has w r arred against the whole countryside for three seasons. Now a special expedition is being formed against the pack, for the settlers realise that its exhibition of fierceness against the lone motorist has proved its ability to attack human beings.