Bundalong breeder Neil Ford says the simple bit is loving the animal.

It gets harder, he points out, when you do everything required to meet your obligations under the law.

For a would-be owner in Victoria, that includes building a pen that meets all the regulations and making sure the dingo can’t get out of your backyard.

Dingoes could and should be walked, he said, but they had to be kept on a lead at all times.

Mr Ford said dingoes were such wonderful animals that even sticking to the rules eventually became easy.

The delight he gets from dingoes is clear as he talks about his latest litter of pups — two males and two females.

One of the alpine dingo male pups is already destined for a woman in Wodonga, while the other three are still for sale for $800 each.

The pups will be five weeks’ old on Monday and will be available to take home at seven weeks.

Mr Ford has always been interested in dingoes.

It was about 30 years ago that he began breeding Australian cattle dogs.

“They were originally bred from a dingo and a blue merle collee back in the 1850s,” he said.

“Today I’ve got more dingoes than I’ve got cattle dogs.”

Mr Ford said a dingo was a “unique, beautiful animal”.

“I just love the affection they give you,” he said.

“And they’ve got a totally different nature to a dog — they’re a very independent animal.

“If they don’t want to participate in what you want to do they won’t.”

Anyone who wants to own a dingo in Victoria must get a dingo permit through the Department of Sustainability and Environment — this costs $127.10 a year.

Mr Ford said the permit — which also covered him for breeding — meant the department knew how many dingoes he had and when they were brought onto his property.

He also has to notify the department when one dies.

The licence sets out requirements for the height of dig-proof and climb-proof fences in the pen area, which must have child-proof gates.

“They don’t need to be locked in their pen all the time provided they’ve got a normal backyard,” Mr Ford said.

“But if you let them out of your pen the backyard has got to be just as secure.”

Mr Ford said it was important to get dingoes used to the outside world — he reckoned the sooner a pup was taken down a noisy, busy street, the happier it would eventually be.

“You’ve got to interact with them a lot,” he said.

“We spend a lot of good, quality time out in the enclosures with them.”