Tag Archives: evolution

Doing the dog paddle

Posted on January 16, 2014 | Leave a comment

If you have ever watched your dog swim, you’ve probably noticed that intense look of concentration on their face. Research has confirmed that swimming doesn’t come as naturally as, say, walking, running or trotting on land.

Photo by the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology

Dr. Frank Fish, a professor of biology at West Chester University, set out with his colleagues to understand how real dogs perform the dog paddle.

Dr Fish found a large horse rehabilitation pool for filming eight dogs of six different breeds during swimming. Dr Fish’s own dog was one of the study subjects.

The team analyzed the videos and found that the dogs were swimming with a gait that was similar to a familiar trot on land. When a dog trots, moving at a pace more brisk than a walk, diagonal pairs of legs move together. In swimming, the dog’s legs move in a similar fashion, but even faster than a trot, and the legs move beyond the range of motion for a trot. (This is one reason why I recommend swimming for many – but not all – of my massage and rehab customers.)

Swimming dogs are, essentially, using a basic movement but with some modification. Also, while the movements that make up terrestrial gaits like trotting can vary from one dog breed to another, the dog paddle gait showed very little variation among the different breeds.

Dr Fish says that dogs can be used as a model for precursors to early swimming mammals. He hopes to unravel the steps in evolution that allowed four-legged terrestrial animals to become swimming mammals like the dolphin.

In the meantime, get out there and let your dog swim. For most dogs, it’s great exercise!

Daisy concentrates during her swim at the Dog Swim Spa

Want to know more about physical rehabilitation and whether swimming is right for your dog? Get in touch with me by completing the information below.

Kathleen Crisley, specialist in dog massage, rehabilitation and nutrition, Canine Catering Ltd, Christchurch, New Zealand

← Back

Thank you for your response. ✨

Source: Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology media release

The ancestral roots of your dog

Posted on July 23, 2013 | Leave a comment

A genetic study by Peter Savolainen, a researcher in evolutionary genetics at KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, has found that dog breeds from North and South America have Asian ancestry.

The Chihuahua definitely has Mexican heritage

The native breeds have 30 percent or less modern replacement by European dogs. It had been thought, prior to this study, that when Europeans settled in the American continent their dog breeds successively replaced the genetics of the native breeds.

Savolainen’s research group, in cooperation with colleagues in Portugal, compared mitochondrial DNA from Asian and European dogs, ancient American archaeological samples, and American dog breeds, including Chihuahuas, Peruvian hairless dogs and Arctic sled dogs.

They traced the American dogs’ ancestry back to East Asian and Siberian dogs, and also found direct relations between ancient American dogs and modern breeds.

The research confirmed conclusively that the modern day Chihuahua has Mexican roots. The breed shares a DNA type uniquely with Mexican pre-Columbian samples.

The team also analysed stray dogs, confirming them generally to be runaway European dogs; but in Mexico and Bolivia they identified populations with high proportions of indigenous ancestry.

Source: AlphaGalileo Foundation news release

Dog intelligence

Posted on July 4, 2012 | Leave a comment

Most dog owners have an opinion about their dog’s intelligence. I regularly hear comments like, “He’s so smart, he’s ahead of the rest of his obedience class” or “He’s not very bright, but we love him.”

When I was working on my management qualification years ago, we were told to go home and ask our partner/flatmate about how they solved problems. Ebony, my Labrador flatmate at the time, came up with these tips, which I thought were very intelligent:

Remember that chasing your tail does not get you anywhere. It also makes you dizzy and less able to focus on the task at hand.
Eat regularly and often. Problem solving is hard work and requires energy.
Don’t underestimate the value of a nap. A problem looks different after you’ve had a good sleep.
If you stare at a problem long enough, it might move on its own.
Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Try looking cute.
If looking cute doesn’t work, try whining.
If whining fails, loud retching noises are guaranteed to get the attention of those around you.
Some problems soften over time. Burying them in the garden hastens this process.
Some problems require more immediate attention. An immediate problem, if left unattended, is likely to result in a much more smelly mess to be cleaned up later.

There are many published works on the subject of dog intelligence. Over the years, I’ve read countless research studies into this subject. There are many institutions involved in the research. All projects have the goal of understanding how dogs think.

Professor Stanley Coren of the University of British Columbia has authored several books about dog intelligence. He states that dogs have the intellectual capacity of a two-year old and can understand more than 150 words.[1]

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology have studied the ability of dogs to interpret human gestures. When researchers hid food beneath one container in a group and pointed to the ‘right’ container, dogs consistently picked up on those cues better than even chimpanzees (a species widely studied because of the evolutionary link between apes and humans).

Earlier this year, a research team at the University of Otago reported on their study that showed that dogs could readily distinguish happy human sounds from sad or angry ones, suggesting an ability to understand human emotions.

Even the dog toy market has recognised that dogs need mental stimulation. The Nina Ottosson range, for example, offers a range of skill level toys designed to make your dog think about how to reveal their food reward.

Daisy demonstrates her intelligence with a Nina Ottosson toy

Despite all of this evidence, including videos of my Daisy using her interactive toys, many of the non-dog people in my life remain unconvinced about the intelligence of dogs. I believe that persistence will pay off. Over time we will see more and more research about the intellectual capacity of our dogs. The non-believers will become believers.

[1] Science Daily, 10 August 2009