I’m gonna talk about the Fuegian dog.
The Fuegian “dog” is the third, forgotten type of domesticated canid, behind the domestic dog and domesticated red foxes. For you see, the Fuegian dog was domesticated from the culpeo (Lycalopex culpaeus). They’re good dogs, Brent:
The Fuegian dog was domesticated by the people of Tierra del Fuego (reports differ regarding whether it was the Yaghan or the Selk’nam people who domesticated them. Could have been both). According to accounts, they would have looked more or less like what you’d expect from a domesticated culpeo: roughly coyote-sized and long-snouted, with pointy upright ears and a long fluffy tail. One report even claims they had webbed feet. Reported colorations range from tawny to gray to white, with patches of black, tan, or white. It apparently barked.
European colonizers did not think highly of the dogs. A French captain in 1883 described it as “ugly […] it looks quite like the fox”. They were noted to be important to Fuegian peoples. Some European reports claim they were affectionate and protective of their masters; others claim they were not particularly loyal when their masters were in danger. They were noted to be used for warmth and hunting otters, and I bet there were more uses the Europeans didn’t notice or write down.
At some point between 1895 and 1919, they were exterminated because the Europeans were scared of them-I mean, “they were a threat to men and cattle”. This would be shortly followed by a genocide of the indigenous people of Tierra del Fuego. There are surviving photos of Selk’nam with dogs, but to me they look more like introduced European dogs.
As of today, only two stuffed specimens of the Fuegian dog remain. Because of this, visiting Punta Arenas and seeing one in person is on my bucket list.
And that’s basically everything that’s known about them.
Restoration of a Fuegian dog by Maija Karala
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