A young boy is being treated for minor injuries after being bitten by a dingo on Fraser Island-K’gari, off southern Queensland.
The nine-year-old was bitten on the hands and legs during the attack at Orchid Beach this morning.
“It was a father and son on the beach who walked past a mob of dingoes that were relaxing on the sand,” a Queensland Ambulance Service (QAS) spokesperson said. “One of the juveniles got up and started walking towards the child — as the child turned around he stumbled in the sand and he fell, and then the dingo advanced onto that child.”
The ABC reports that the boy’s father managed to scare away the dingo before an off-duty registered nurse treated the boy for minor abrasions to his knee and hand.
Paramedics assessed the child, but no further treatment was required.
The incident comes less than two weeks after a female dingo and two pups lunged at a father and son on K’gari.
A spokesperson for the Department of Environment told the ABC that it was a reminder for people to be cautious around dingoes on the island.
“Never feed dingoes, they can get used to people and act aggressively wanting human food,” the spokesperson said. “Dingoes will occasionally approach humans, because they are naturally curious … they should be treated with absolute caution, remember, these are wild and unpredictable animals.”
There have been a number of dingo attacks on the island in recent years. In 2019, a 14-month-old boy suffered a fractured skull and cuts to his head after a dingo dragged him from a campervan.
Late last month, it was announced that the four Fraser Island campsites that were closed last year due to dingo activity are to stay shut due to ongoing poor behaviour by visitors.
The Eli, Maheno, Guluri and Wahba campgrounds were made off limits to overnighters in September because of what the Queensland environment department described as “inappropriate human interactions with dingoes”.
Have just come back from Orchid Beach in January, there are heaps of juvenile dingoes around at the moment. I had one walking behind me on the beach and just ignored it. We always watch our grand-kids as the dingoes come right up to our house. The main problem is the bloody idiots that feed them. The island was already greening up again when we were there. We know the island pretty well as we have been going up there for over 30 years. There was no problems with dingoes when the brumbies where on the island.
They should be culled and not let roam around if you’re going to have holiday makers there .I wouldn’t go there