Species: culpeo fox

The culpeo, sometimes known as the zorro culpeo or Andean fox, is a canid species belonging to the South American fox genus, or lycalopex. It is the second-largest canid species on the South American continent, only being smaller than the maned wolf.

At some point in history, the culpeo was domesticated to form the Fuegian dog. However, this species became extinct sometime between 1880 and 1919, because it was aggressive and not loyal to its masters. In addition, in the 1880s, Anglican missionary Thomas Bridges wrote of their aggressive behaviour, saying that they had attacked his mission's goats. Their dangerous behaviour had led to their extermination according to a 1919 visit to the Yaghan people by Silesian missionary Martin Gusinde. The Fuegian dogs were exterminated because they "were dangerous to men and cattle".

This makes the culpeo the only species that has been domesticated that outlasted its domesticated subspecies.

The following tags are aliased to this tag: andean_fox, culpeo (learn more).

This tag implicates south_american_fox (learn more).