Thirteen pairs of eyes glow back at a camera trap…plus a lucky duck for decoration!
Limpopo, South Africa (20 May 2026) – A pack of thirteen African wild dogs spent a few days wandering through the Hoedspruit Wildlife Estate. The sightings caught on the property’s camera traps are extra special!
Wildlife photographer and photo safari guide Villiers Steyn, known as The Safari Expert, shared the footage on social media.
“Look who came to visit The Hoedspruit Wildlife Estate last month! A pack of thirteen African wild dogs were seen right throughout the estate over the last few days of April 2026. What a privilege to have them visit…” he wrote.
More than 73,000 people have watched it since, and counting:
The sighting is much more than beautiful once you understand how few African wild dogs are currently left in the wild. They are South Africa’s most endangered carnivore, and the only surviving member of their evolutionary genus.
No two individuals share the same markings, which makes each dog as distinct as a snowflake or a fingerprint!
Sadly, over time, they’ve lost more than 90% of their historical range. Today, fewer than 6600 individuals remain across the continent, and of those, fewer than 1400 are mature adults contributing to breeding populations.
In South Africa, the number stands at fewer than 600 left in the wild.
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Local Ocean Champion Zoë Prinsloo Takes Her Mission Global!Our African wild dogs face several threats. Habitat fragmentation destroys the vast territories packs need to thrive, and human-wildlife conflict, unfortunately, remains a pressure. When populations become too small and too isolated, the genetic and social dynamics known to sustain healthy packs start to unravel.
Conservationists are going through great lengths to reverse the red. Local organisations like the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT), Wildlife ACT, and the Wild Dog Advisory Group of South Africa all fight to protect and conserve the species through targeted translocations and monitoring.
This work really does make a difference. Just recently, EWT coordinated the reintroduction of a newly formed pack into Zimanga Private Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal, returning African wild dogs to a landscape that hadn’t seen them in over a decade!
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