Sunday 26 June 2011

did humans breed into dogs the desire to bark?

Slavenka has a link to an interesting article about the possible evolution of barking in dogs.

In part, the article quotes Eugene Morton, a zoologist and animal communication expert at the National Zoo, [I'm not sure which zoo that is]:
“Barks are used by juvenile wolves, by pups. It’s neotenic — something derived from a juvenile stage, and kept in adults. That’s probably what we selected for,” said Morton. “We don’t want dogs who are dominant over us. The bark might go along with that breeding for juvenile behavior. Or it could have come with something else we selected, such as a lack of aggression.”
That reminds me of an amusing idea I once heard, that dogs are wolves that never really grow up, and we like playing with them, because we are apes that also never grow up! Whenever Penny and I are running around the house playing keepings-off with a soft toy, I think of it, lol.

6 comments:

Charlie said...

Interesting thoughts!
- Charlie

parlance said...

Charlie, dogs are always making us humans have interesting thoughts!

Jaana said...

I really like the idea of juvenile wolves playing with juvenile apes :D

I think you might have heard about the experiment in Russia a long time ago when in a fur farm they started selecting foxes for their temperament to make them more friendly and easier to handle. With this change in temperament came other changes- dropping ears, white patches and if I remember correctly they also barked more. Just maybe there are some links between certain traits and when the dogs domesticated themselves, the ones that had the temperament suitable, might also have had some other linked traits as well.

Just a stray thought on my part...

parlance said...

Hi, Jaana, Interesting you should mention that! I was in the waiting room at the skin specialist (for Penny - sigh...) just last week and started reading a big National Geographic article about the domestication of dogs, and it talked about that amazing project. I still have to track down the article so I can read the rest of it. It was 2011, though - which is startling for a magazine in a waiting room!)

Jaana said...

If you type "The Silver Fox Experient" in YouTube there is a video about that. I have seen some other videos as well with more of these unusual (for foxes) caracteristics showing but couldn't find them anymore.

parlance said...

Thanks, Jaana, I'll have a look.