The Queensland Government recently announced a relaxation of restrictions on the use of poisoned bait to allow farmers to "tackle the problem" of dingoes. Similar measures have already been taken in Victoria. Will dingo protection come too late? Fifty-nine days after legislation was passed protecting the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger, the species became extinct. The thylacine story of 1936 may repeat that story today for the many species we find inconvenient. The dingo, sharks, wolves, to give some examples. The last thylacine died alone in Beaumaris Zoo, Hobart, but the death alarm bell rang much earlier. It's time to rethink our approach to how we manage wild populations. Lethal methods of control have lethal consequences: coexistence is not useless, but essential. The thylacine was hunted due to the alleged damage caused by the species to the Tasmanian sheep industry. However, the thylacine's actual impact on the industry was likely limited. The species became the scapegoat for the mismanagement and harshness of Tasmania's environment, as early Europeans struggled to implement foreign agricultural practices in the new world. Today the history of the dingo mirrors that of the thylacine; a species blamed for the sheep industry's problems. It's hard to survive in this industry, due to drought, international competition and volatile wool and meat markets, but the one place you can exact revenge is on the dingo. As a result, the dingo has suffered severe range contraction since European settlement and there is growing pressure to remove the dingo from the wild, which it has called Australia home for over 4000 years. bad character in yesterday's Assembly; in fact, t...... half of the document ......rvation of genetically ambiguous species. Traditionally, barrier fences and lethal control are used as methods to reduce livestock losses caused by dingoes, however the costs of removing dingoes as our free pest manager and the impact of fences as barriers to other wildlife must be taken into account when evaluating the true cost of maintaining these approaches. There are alternatives to lethal control. Guard dogs can protect livestock from dog attacks and have a return on investment of 1 to 3 years. New cost-effective strategies are therefore available to allow both dingo and grazing to coexist. It is clear that for over 4000 years dingoes have played a functional role in the Australian landscape and can provide benefits to farmers and conservation. It's time to learn to live with the dingo. Otherwise the dingo's story will unfold with a titillating ending.