National Geographic: Those Wonderful Dogs Page #3

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The mainstay of the

wolf's diet are animals

the size of deer

small moose, or elk

Pack behavior is

strictly regulated by a

dominance hierarchy

understood by all members

In the dog, pack loyalty

is basically unaltered

even after thousands

of years of domestication

The main difference is the dog

looks to man as leader of the pack

Modern-da scientists have

pondered why early man

himself a flesh-eating hunter

would have turned competitors

like wolves or wild dogs into allies

Animal behaviorist Dr. Michael Fox

one of the world's leading

experts on wolves and dogs

has one explanation for

how the partnership may have begun

"I feel that dogs

and humans came together

because of their

similarity in lifestyles

to the degree that we hunted

in small packs

we were gatherer-hunters

and the dog-wolf ancestor

was like that too"

"And it's quite probable that the

early hunting societies found

that dogs were pretty good allies

if they were properly

socialized to help locate

and even ambush prey"

"Dogs, in their long

association with us

have powers of manipulation"

"In one sense we have

domesticated them

but they have domesticated us too

We have the situation

where the dog will come up

and just look at you and look at

you and you have to feed it

The dog knows how

to touch your heart

They have a power in the eye"

"Some people think that

their dogs have ESP

that they know what

you're feeling and thinking

But they are acute observers

of our body language depressed happy

or anxious and reading

all that all the time...

"...because that's how they

communicate with each other too"

In finding out about each other

and the rest of the world

smell is the

dog's primary tool

It is said their

ability to smell is at least

than our own

Their hearing

too, is better than ours

but they see less

well and are colorblind

There are 350 recognized

breeds of dogs in the world

Regardless of

outward differences

they are all the same species,

Canis familiaris

Their wide diversity

in appearance can often be

explained by the

work humans have bred dogs to do

In the language of

his native Germany

dachshund means "badger dog"

His short, stubby

legs and narrow body made him

ideal for squeezing

into burrows after prey

Terriers, too, were bred small

and low to the ground

so they could plunge into dark

holes in pursuit of rats or foxes

The name terrier comes from

the Latin word terra, or earth

Whippets and greyhounds

are long-legged

and sleek because they

were bred for hunting and racing

Firehouse mascots today

Dalmatians were companions

to charioteers in ancient times

In Elizabethan England they

gained fame as coach dogs

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