The dingo is a dog that is native to Australia. The species name is debated: it is variously called either Canis familiaris, Canis familiaris dingo, Canis lupus dingo, or Canis dingo. It is either a purebred if breeding only in the wild, or a hybrid of a dingo and a domesticated dog. It is a medium-sized canid that possesses a lean, hardy body adapted for speed, agility, and stamina. The dingo's three main coat colours are: light ginger or tan, black and tan, or creamy white. The skull, the widest part of the dingo, is wedge-shaped and large in proportion to the body. It differs from that of the domestic dog by its larger palatal width, longer rostrum, shorter skull height, and wider sagittal crest.The earliest known dingo fossil, found in Western Australia, dates to 3,450 years ago (YBP), which led to the presumption that dingoes came to Australia with seafarers prior to that time. Dingo morphology has not changed over the past 3,500 years: this suggests that no artificial selection has been applied over this period.The dingo is closely related to the New Guinea singing dog : their lineage split early from the lineage that led to today's domestic dogs, and can be traced back through the Malay Archipelago to Asia. A recent genetic study shows that the lineage of those dingoes found today in the northwestern part of the Australian continent split from the lineage of the New Guinea singing dog and southeastern dingo 8,300 YBP, followed by a split between the New Guinea singing dog lineage from the southeastern dingo lineage 7,800 YBP. The study proposes that two dingo migrations occurred when sea levels were lower and Australia and New Guinea formed one landmass named Sahul that existed until 6,500–8,000 years ago. Seafarers from south- west Sulawesi in modern- day Indonesia may have brought the dingo to northern Australia.The dingo's habitat covers most of Australia, but they are completely absent in the southwest, a strip on the eastern coast, and an area on the southwest coast (see map ).
