Gun for hire Don Sallway leads assault against Queensland's wild dogs

 Don sits in his ute on a property in south-west Queensland.
(ABC News: Giulio Saggin) 

By Giulio Saggin
ABC News
           

"At times I have 180-200 traps set and I know where every one is. It's all GPS-ed up here," says Don Sallway, tapping his head. "I have around seven million acres stored away."

Don is a dogger - a dog trapper - and he's the top dog in his field.


During his 20-year career trapping wild dogs on properties throughout south-west Queensland, the 52-year-old has regularly caught twice as many dogs as his nearest rival.

When Don has finished laying a trap, it's impossible to tell he's been there.
Several years ago, after laying traps on another property, a tractor and 4WD drove through and busted them all.
"They told me they couldn't see the traps. What were they expecting? A cage and a dish of milk?"
Don is a hired gun, working for property owners who form a syndicate and contract his services.
Each contract lasts between two and three months and he is paid per kill, the cost of which is split between the local shire council and the syndicate.
Don has averaged over 600 kills for the past few years and, at $500 per dog and $100 per puppy, it seems good money.
Considering he is the best dogger by a country mile, he could easily ask for double that but he has been charging the same his entire career.
And he works hard for his money.
Wild dogs never take a day off and neither does Don.
Last year he worked 361 days and during summer he spends 20 hours a day "on the job".

Don rides his motorbike onto the back of his ute. (ABC News: Giulio Saggin)

He doesn't bother with a swag and sleeps on the ground under the stars.
It's nothing for Don to spend 12 hours sitting up a tree waiting to make a kill and he covers an average of 200 kilometres a day, using his ute and/or motorbike.
Both take a beating and he replaces his bike every year.
Don works long hours because he knows what he does affects other people's livelihoods.
If he isn't killing dogs, they're killing someone's livestock - their livelihood.
Even after 20 years, he is still respectful of his quarry and the task at hand.

You can't just put a trap anywhere and expect to catch a dog. You have to do your research and look for a consistent pattern, then lay your trap accordingly.                Don Sallway

"There's nothing sure about catching dogs; patience is the key," he says.
"You can't just put a trap anywhere and expect to catch a dog. You have to do your research and look for a consistent pattern, then lay your trap accordingly.
"A dog might work 60-100,000 acres, so if you can work out its pattern, you'll get a fair crack at it.
"I might ride for three days to find the right track."



Don uses a sieve to spread the layer of top soil, which he'd earlier removed,
over one of his traps. (ABC News: Giulio Saggin) 

Once a dog's pattern has been worked out, knowing how and where to lay a trap is essential.

Success as a dogger is the sum of many parts coming together at the one place and time.

"Out of all those thousands of acres, you've got to stand the dog on that plate on the trap. It's a skill," Don says.
Human scent lingers for up to a fortnight and Don takes every precaution to avoid leaving his scent when laying a trap.
This includes spreading a blanket to stand on and using a syringe to squirt dog urine, harvested from his own dogs, near the trap.
The blanket needs to be the right way up or Don's scent will be left on the ground.
The dog urine is used as a decoy scent and draws the wild dogs in to investigate. How does Don harvest the dog urine?

Out of all those thousands of acres, you've got to stand the dog on that plate on the trap. It's a skill. Don Sallway 

  "That's a trade secret."

Don even goes so far as to remove a centimetre of top soil and place it back on top when he's finished. The soil below top soil has a different smell, like a plowed field.
Dogs will pick up on anything out of the ordinary and it's Don's job to make a dog believe he hasn't been there.
Wild dogs attack anything that moves, including goats, calves, rabbits, kangaroos, emus and sheep.


Don uses a sieve to spread the layer of top soil, which he'd earlier removed,
over one of his traps. (ABC News: Giulio Saggin)

They can decimate livestock numbers but, unlike other predators, they don't always kill what they catch.
They will take down sheep and lambs, tear open their stomach and eat only their kidneys.
This doesn't kill the animal and when farmers find their stock in this state, often days later, they have no option but to shoot the animal and put it out of its misery.
Don has seen firsthand the destruction wild dogs can bring and shows no sympathy towards them.
"Wild dogs hunt for the sake of hunting. It's a big game to them, especially the young dogs," he says.
"Dogs can maul a herd in one night and this can be devastating to a farmer."
Half a million sheep vanished from central western Queensland between 2008 and 2011 and graziers blame many of these losses on wild dogs.

Wild dogs hunt for the sake of hunting. It's a big game to them, especially the young dogs. Dogs can maul a herd in one night and this can be devastating to a farmer.    Don Sallway

 The introduction of preventative methods such as 1080 poison initially brought a reprieve in numbers, but a lack of baiting has seen the numbers steadily increase to the point where many properties have switched from sheep to cattle.

As a result, the number of sheep shorn in Queensland since 1990 has dropped from 21 million to less than 2 million.
As well as killing fully grown dogs, Don also has to eradicate wild dog puppies, which appear as cute as any other puppies.
The only difference is these puppies are taught to kill from around three months old and grow to be wild dogs that wreak the same destruction as their predecessors.
"Dogs don't start off smart," Don says.
"They're taught to be smart."
It's not unusual for wild dog puppies to be left inside the hollow of a log during times of danger or when the bitch goes hunting.When Don finds a log with puppies, he blocks one or more ends of the log so the puppies can't escape.




Don retrieves a third wild dog puppy from a log. (ABC News: Giulio Saggin)

When 'logging' - extracting puppies from a log - begins, Don carefully cuts into the log with an axe or chainsaw.
Sometimes the puppies are right there. Other times he has to reach deep into the log.
If the puppies have moved down the log, Don keeps cutting open the log until he reaches them, at which point he pulls them out one by one and puts them into a large cage he brings with him.
Sometimes by the time Don has finished with a log, it's nothing more than fire wood.
If the dog or the bitch haven't been caught, Don will place the cage in a shaded area close to where he found the puppies.
He leaves water and food for the puppies, sets a few well-placed traps and returns the next day in the hope the bitch and/or dog has been snared.

A dog might work 60-100,000 acres, so if you can work out its pattern, you'll get a fair crack at it. I might ride for three days to find the right track.

Don Sallway  

 If a bitch has puppies there, she will keep in the area.

If Don took the puppies away there would be no reason for her to hang around and she would disappear into the bush to breed again.
When Don finds a dog in one of his traps, he works quickly to put it out of its misery with a single bullet to the head from his Savage 22-250 rifle.
He might have little sympathy for them, but he doesn't want to prolong their agony either.
Don is trying his best to lessen the impact of wild dogs on the millions of acres he services, but even working 361-days-a-year and being twice as good as anyone else isn't halting the progress of wild dogs.
As one sheep grazier noted, "Don Sallway is the best in the business. We need 1000 Don Sallways to bring this problem under control."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-28/dog-trapper/4917640?section=qld