PASTORALISTS are warning of increased pressure on the Dog Fence as dingoes breed unchecked on its north side and with an appetite for lamb, head south through the flood-damaged fence.
Massive rains and floods have swept away about 5 kilometres of the fence on Clayton Station, Marree.
Owner Shane Oldfield said dogs were thick on the fence before the damage and he had already seen half a dozen get through where the fence was down.
Maintenance workers have only just been able to access the damaged fence and repairs are expected to be completed by Saturday.
The extent of damage at other sections remains unknown, with many flood-hit tracts of land inaccessible.
Tony Williams, Mount Barry Station, Coober Pedy said wild dogs outside the fence were at their highest levels since the 1970s, despite a 35-kilometre buffer zone outside the fence where dog baiting (with 1080 poison) was permitted.
Mr Williams said it seemed that any baiting was carried out just along the fence but not throughout the buffer zone.
“If there is no help outside the fence, the problem inside is going to get a lot worse,” he said.
The dingoes had never been so “thick or cheeky” since the mid-1970s and he regularly had dingoes “right by the homestead”.
A spokesperson for the Dog Fence Board said landholders or fence-maintenance staff baited in the buffer zone – around watering points – in April and November each year, funded by fence levy-payers and the State Government.
All landholders outside in the buffer zone were able to access baits and a bait-ejector service biannually, and it was up to them if they wanted to be involved.
The Arid Lands Natural Resource Management Board’s Biteback program was in full swing with its biannual bait-ejector services.
As an added incentive, landholders involved in the bait-ejector services would receive a free bucket of manufactured baits.
