Dog Puppy Health and Care Information

Dogs and Human relationships

Editor — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 23:08:48 GMT

Human socialization of Dogs

Dogs, like humans, are highly social animals and this similarity in their overall
behavioral pattern accounts for their trainability, playfulness, and ability to fit into
human households and social situations. This similarity has earned dogs a unique
position in the realm of interspecies relationships.

The loyalty and devotion that dogs demonstrate as part of their natural instincts as
pack animals closely mimics the human idea of love and friendship, leading many
dog owners to view their pets as full-fledged family members. Conversely, dogs seem
to view their human companions as members of their pack, and make few, if any,
distinctions between their owners and fellow dogs. Dogs fill a variety of roles in human
society and are often trained as working dogs. For dogs that do not have traditional
jobs, a wide range of dog sports provide the opportunity to exhibit their natural skills.
In many countries, the most common and perhaps most important role of dogs is as
companions.

Dogs have lived and worked with humans in so many roles that their loyalty has
earned them the unique sobriquet "man's best friend". However, some cultures
consider dogs to be unclean. In some parts of the world, dogs are raised as livestock
to produce dog meat for human consumption. In many places, consumption of dog
meat is discouraged by social convention or cultural taboo.

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Dog Domestication

Editor — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 23:31:49 GMT

Dogs will become dogs: Domestication

Human hunter-gatherers and wolves experienced several overlaps as both are social
species, they shared habitat and hunted the same prey. There are several theories to
explain possible routes for domestication of the dog:

   1. Orphaned wolf-cubs: Studies have shown that some wolf pups taken at an early
age and reared by humans are easily tamed and socialized. Once these early adoptees
started breeding amongst themselves, a new generation of tame "wolf-like" domestic
animals would result which would over generations of time, become more dog-like.

   2. Early wolves would, as scavengers, be attracted to the bones and refuse dumps
of human campsites. Dr. Raymond Coppinger of Hampshire College, Massachusetts,
argues that those wolves that were more succesful at interacting with with humans
would pass these traits onto their offspring, eventually creating wolves with a greater
propensity to be domesticated. Coppinger believes that a behavioral characteristic
called "flight distance" was crucial to the transformation from wild wolf to the
ancestors of the modern dog. It represents how close an animal will allow humans
(or anything else it perceives as dangerous) to get before it runs away. Animals ith
shorter flight distances will linger, and feed, when humans are close by; this
behavioral trait would have been passed on to successive generations, and amplified,
creating animals that are increasingly more comfortable around humans. "My
argument is that what domesticated-or tame-means is to be able to eat in the
presence of human beings.

That is the thing that wild wolves can't do."[a] Hypothetically, wolves separated into
two populations - the village-oriented scavengers and the packs of hunters. The next
steps have not been defined, but selective pressure must have been present to
sustain the divergence of these populations.

   3. As a beast of burden: North American Indians used dog-sized travois before
adapting the horse for this purpose, and huskies are famous for pulling sleds for Inuit
communities. It is very probable that the dog was the original beast of burden before
the domestication of the horse or ox.

   4. Dogs as a source of food and fur: Whilst Westerners have difficulty thinking of
dogs (or wolves) as a source of meat, wolf fur is a highly prized commodity.

Archaeology has placed the earliest known domestication at potentially
12,000 BCE-10,000 BCE and with certainty at 7,000 BCE. Domestication of the wolf
over time has produced a number of physical changes typical of all domesticated
mammals. These include: a reduction in overall size; changes in coat colouration and
markings; a shorter jaw initially with crowding of the teeth and, later, with the
shrinking in size of the teeth; a reduction in brain size and intelligence and thus i
cranial capacity (particularly those areas relating to alertness and sensory processing,
necessary in the wild); and the development of a pronounced “stop”, or vertical drop
in front of the forehead (brachycephaly). Behaviourally, the wagging of tails and
barking are behaviours only found in wolf puppies, retained via neoteny throughout
the dog's life. Certain wolf-like behaviours, such as the regurgitation of partially
digested food for the young, have also disappeared.

As an experiment in the domestication of wolves, the "farm fox" experiment of Russian
scientist Dmitry Belyaev [b] attempted to reenact of how domestication may have
occurred. Researchers working with selectively breeding wild silver foxes over
thirty-five generations and forty years for the sole trait of friendliness to humans,
created more dog-like animals.

The "domestic elite" foxes are much more friendly to humans and actually seek human
attention, but they also show new physical traits that parallel the selection for
tameness, even though the physical traits were not originally selected for. They
include spotted or black-and-white coats, floppy ears, tails that curl over their backs,
and earlier sexual maturity. It was reported "On average, the domestic foxes respond
to sounds two days earlier and open their eyes one day earlier than their
non-domesticated cousins. More striking is that their socialization period has greatly
increased. Instead of developing a fear response at 6 weeks of age, the domesticated
foxes don't show it until 9 weeks of age or later. The whimpering and tail wagging is a
holdover from puppyhood, as are the foreshortened face and muzzle. Even the new
coat colors can be explained by the altered timing of development. One researcher
found that the migration of certain melanocytes (which determine colour) was
delayed, resulting in a black and white 'star' pattern."[1]

Looks like wolves ruled until they became dogs

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Dogs and Human relationships | Dog Domestication | Ancient Dogs | Canis lupus familiaris
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Ancient Dogs

Editor — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 23:24:03 GMT

The earliest fossil carnivores(dogs) that can be linked with some certainty to canids are
the Eocene Miacids some 55 to 38 million years ago. Are we talking dinosars here. From
the miacids evolved the cat-like (Feloidea) and dog-like (Canoidea) carnivores.

Most important to the ancestry of the dog was the canoid line, leading from the
coyote-sized Mesocyon of the Oligocene (38 to 24 million years ago), this is alot closer
to current time, I remember like it was yesterday, to the fox-like Leptocyon and the
wolf-like Tomarctus that roamed North America some 10 million years ago. From the time
of Tomarctus, dog-like carnivores have expanded throughout the world.[1]

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Dogs and Human relationships | Dog Domestication | Ancient Dogs | Canis lupus familiaris
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Canis lupus familiaris

Editor — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 23:26:30 GMT

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The dog is a domestic subspecies of the wolf, a mammal of the Canidae family of the
order Carnivora. The term encompasses both feral and pet variants. It is also
sometimes used to describe wild canids of other subspecies or species.

Over time, the dog has developed into hundreds of breeds with a great degree of
variation. For example, heights at the withers range from just a few inches
(the Chihuahua) to roughly three feet (the Irish Wolfhound); colors vary from white
through grays to black, and browns from light (tan) to dark ("red" or "chocolate") in
a tremendous variation of patterns; and coats can be anything from very short to
several centimeters long, from coarse hair to something akin to wool, straight or
curly, or smooth.

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Dogs and Human relationships | Dog Domestication | Ancient Dogs | Canis lupus familiaris
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About Dog2Dogs.com

Editor — Thu, 21 Jun 2007 23:30:25 GMT

About Us

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friend the Dog.

We review dog products: Dry Food, Wet food, collars, flea treatment products, shampoo, cloths, health and higine, and lets not forget all products for puppies.

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