Sent in to me by Cynthia Gomez, and it’s just gorgeous.
Marieles Dinner – Funny dog eats elegant at table
Published on Nov 22, 2013
Mariele, the German Shorthaired Pointer is the top model. She likes to eat in high-class places.
This little show took place in summer 2013. Mariele is sitting at the table and is looking forward to getting served. It took just a few training lessons for Mariele to get used to the situation because there is nothing further to do for her as to sit quite comfortable on a cushion and wait patiently for the food to come. Mariele is 12 years old and in younger years she worked as a rescue dog. She loves to make new experiences and she is very gentle. The temptation to wolf down sausages and meat would have been too strong to her. So we decided to serve carrots and potatoes which she likes too — but not too much…
We got inspired by TWO DOGS DINING — thank you very much.
Dogs and humans go back even further than previously thought.
Humans and dogs were constant companions well before our ancestors settled in villages and started growing crops 10,000 years ago …
I have no doubt that thousands of dog owners all around the world must be enthralled by the way that dogs relate to us and, in turn, how we humans relate to dogs. More than once a day, one of our dogs will do something that has me and Jean marvelling at their way of living so close to us.
Then when one starts to reflect on how long dogs and humans have been together, perhaps it could be seen as the direct result of that length of relationship.
Now there’s nothing new in me writing this, after all the home page of Learning from Dogs states:
Yet they have been part of man’s world for an unimaginable time, at least 30,000 years. That makes the domesticated dog the longest animal companion to man, by far!
Back in May the website Livescience published an article that revealed more about the length of our relationship with dogs. This is how it opened:
Ancient Wolf DNA Could Solve Dog Origin Mystery
by Becky Oskin, Senior Writer
Humans and dogs were constant companions well before our ancestors settled in villages and started growing crops 10,000 years ago, a new study suggests.
Genetic evidence from an ancient wolf bone discovered lying on the tundra in Siberia’s Taimyr Peninsula reveals that wolves and dogs split from their common ancestor at least 27,000 years ago. “Although separation isn’t the same as domestication, this opens up the possibility that domestication occurred much earlier than we thought before,” said lead study author Pontus Skoglund, who studies ancient DNA at Harvard Medical School and the Broad Institute in Massachusetts. Previously, scientists had pegged the wolf-dog split at no earlier than 16,000 years ago.
The Livescience article referred to results that were published in the journal Current Biology on May 21st this year. One needs a subscription to read the full report but here is their summary:
The origin of domestic dogs is poorly understood [ 1–15 ], with suggested evidence of dog-like features in fossils that predate the Last Glacial Maximum [ 6, 9, 10, 14, 16 ] conflicting with genetic estimates of a more recent divergence between dogs and worldwide wolf populations [ 13, 15, 17–19 ]. Here, we present a draft genome sequence from a 35,000-year-old wolf from the Taimyr Peninsula in northern Siberia. We find that this individual belonged to a population that diverged from the common ancestor of present-day wolves and dogs very close in time to the appearance of the domestic dog lineage. We use the directly dated ancient wolf genome to recalibrate the molecular timescale of wolves and dogs and find that the mutation rate is substantially slower than assumed by most previous studies, suggesting that the ancestors of dogs were separated from present-day wolves before the Last Glacial Maximum. We also find evidence of introgression from the archaic Taimyr wolf lineage into present-day dog breeds from northeast Siberia and Greenland, contributing between 1.4% and 27.3% of their ancestry. This demonstrates that the ancestry of present-day dogs is derived from multiple regional wolf populations.
That summary page also includes the following Graphical Abstract:
I don’t have permission to republish the Livescience article in full but would like to offer the closing paragraphs of this fascinating report.
“It is a very well-done paper,” Perry [George Perry, an expert in ancient DNA at Pennsylvania State University] told Live Science. “This topic is a critical one for our understanding of human evolution and human-environment interactions in the Paleolithic. Partnership with early dogs may have facilitated more efficient hunting strategies.”
If dogs first befriended hunter-gatherers, rather than farmers, then perhaps the animals helped with hunting or keeping other carnivores away. For instance, an author of a new book claims humans and dogs teamed up to drive Neanderthals to extinction. Skoglund also suggested the Siberian husky followed nomads across the Bering Land Bridge, picking up wolf DNA along the way.
“It might have been beneficial for them to absorb genes that were adapted to this high Arctic environment,” Skoglund said.
This is the first wolf genome from the Pleistocene, and more ancient DNA from prehistoric fossils could provide further insights into the relationship between wolves, dogs and humans, the researchers said.
Yes, our dogs have been part of man’s world for an unimaginable time – and Jean and I, as with tens of thousands of others, can’t imagine a world without dogs.
The photographs were sent to me by Dan Gomez, underlining the wonderful way that so much is shared in this funny old world of blogging. Thank you, Dan!
Very grateful to Chris Snuggs for sending this on to me. As seen on the BoredBug website:
ooOOoo
They Told This Little Boy His Dog Was Going To Be Put Down. His Response STUNNED Them.
On Belker’s last day, Shane seemed calm, petting the old dog as if he understood that he was saying a last “goodbye”. Within minutes, Belker slipped peacefully away. Shane seemed to accept Belker’s transition without any difficulty or confusion.
They all sat together after Belker’s death, wondering aloud how sad it is that animals lives are shorter than humans. Shane, who had been listening quietly, spoke ”I know why! People are born so that they can learn how to live a good life, like loving everybody all the time and being nice, right?” The six-year-old continued, ”Well, dogs already know how to do that, so they don’t have to stay as long.”
A story about a Pit Bull that will touch the soul.
The Pit Bull dog breed gets a very bad press thanks to the despicable way that these dogs were associated with dog fighting many years ago. But take away man’s disgraceful involvement and most times you will find a gorgeous, loving dog.
We have a Pit Bull mix here at home.
Casey, at home; picture taken January, 2014.
He is the most wonderful of dogs.
Now read this article, as seen on Mother Nature Network.
ooOOoo
Rescued pit bull helps autistic teen open his heart
The first time Joey Granados gave his mother a kiss on the cheek was when they adopted Roxy.
The best part about Roxy and Joey’s friendship? No judgments. Just love. (Photo: Amanda Granados/Instagram)
Pit bulls often get a bad rap. So do kids with autism.
Both are misunderstood. But what happens when you put the two of them together? Magic.
Just ask Amanda Granados of Los Angeles. Her son, Joey, has autism. From an early age, Joey turned away from his mom’s hugs and kisses. He would not let his mom hold his hand. He preferred to be alone. According to his mom, Joey had a really difficult time adjusting in social situations.
But Joey has recently met a new friend that has opened up his heart to his mom and others in his world. That friend is Roxy, a goofy, loving pit bull who knows how it feels to have people look at you and think you are something you are not.
Fourteen-year-old Joey had been asking his mom for a dog for some time to help him deal with the loneliness of his life with autism. Just after Thanksgiving, Amanda was perusing the website for the local animal shelter when she came across Roxy’s picture and just knew that this would be a good match.
As Joey tells it, when he and his mom went down to the shelter to look at Roxy, the dog walked right passed Amanda and jumped on Joey’s lap. The two have been best friends ever since. And Roxy has opened up Joey’s world to the love and affection of others.
“I get emotional thinking about it,” Amanda Granados recently told “Today.” “For all those years, he wouldn’t hold my hand, he wouldn’t hug me — it was all part of the autism — but this dog has taught him how to give and show affection. He holds my hand now! He hugs me! The first time I got a kiss on the cheek was when Roxy came home.”
Joey told “Today” that Roxy has made it easier for him to give and receive affection.
“I didn’t have too many friends growing up, but then we got Roxy and I’ve been able to make friends ever since,” Joey said. “At home, I’ve been able to hold my mom’s hand, kiss her, hug her and do a lot of things that I hadn’t been able to do growing up.
“She’s opened up my heart.”
According to Amanda, the best part about the bond between Roxy and Joey is that there are no judgments. Just true friendship. And lots and lots of love.
Want to see this adorable pair in action? Check it out:
Regular readers will know that I subscribe to the blog Naked Capitalism masterminded by Yves Smith. Some time ago, there was a link on NK to a story about how a tiny Chihuahua dog rescued some missing girls. It seemed like a good opportunity to take a closer look at this most magical aspect of a dog’s qualities.
First to that story.
I saw it on the Care2 website, from which I quote the following:
A 3-year-old chihuahua named Bell is an unexpected hero after finding three young girls who became lost for hours in the woods in Newnan, Georgia, on Monday.
CBS Atlanta reports that, on Monday, 8-year-old Carlie and 5-year-old Lacey Parga went for a walk with their dog Lucy down a cul-de-sac on trails near their neighborhood.
What started as a casual stroll became an unintended, and at times frightening, experience. As Carlie tells CBS, ‘”We tried to find our way out of the woods. We kept following paths and stuff and we got lost.” Indeed, they became scared that they were only to get more and more lost.
Carlie’s father, David Parga, noted that it wasn’t characteristic of them to wander off and, after searching for them but not hearing them respond, he contacted police and firefighters. Neighbors joined them including Carvin Young who thought to take Bell, who plays with the girls every day and knew their scent. Bell was able to lead searchers to the girls.
The full story on the Care2 website is here and on the CBS website here.
So what is it about the nose of the dog? A dog has more than 220 million olfactory receptors in its nose, while humans have only five million, making dogs’ sense of smell a thousand times greater. Frankly, trying to get one’s intellect around precisely what having a sense of smell one thousand times greater than a human means is tough! So on to another story.
17 Dogs, 3 Generations, 70 Years. There’s one constant… …the family dog.
After moving to Wellesley, Massachusetts for an anchor job with a major television sports network, Kevin began taking his German Shepherd, Beverly, for walks in the surrounding neighborhoods. They developed a route that included historic Atwood Street. Beverly kept veering toward one house in particular that had also caught Kevin’s eye previously, thinking it looked familiar but not knowing the reason.
After talking to a close family relative who had also once lived in Wellesley, Kevin was shocked to discover that the memorable house had once been a childhood home to his father, Bob Walsh, before WWII. After digging through old family photos that had been tucked away for years, Kevin uncovered a picture of his father as a toddler with his family on the house’s front porch, complete with their first family dog, Dee Dee.
Kevin’s father had been writing short stories about all of their family dogs through the years, but never knew about the photo. Its discovery was the pivotal moment that offered proof that the Walsh family’s journey with dogs had come back to the exact place where it started.
They’ve turned this story, along with other dog tales, into a book called Follow the Dog Home: How a Simple Walk Unleashed an Incredible Family Journey.
Dog’s nose leads family to back long lost old home, site unseen. German Shepherd, Beverly, is chronicled on WCVB TV’s news magazine show Chronicle. 70 years later, the family goes back “home” for stunning reunion and photograph.
Republished for the wider promotion of this alert.
Dear Fellow Dog Lover,
Because you signed up on our website and asked to be notified, I’m sending you this special recall alert.
On July 7, 2015, Carnivore Meat Company of Green Bay, Wisconsin, announced it is voluntarily recalling two batches of its Vital Essentials raw frozen dog food due to possible contamination with Listeria bacteria.
Listeria is not only dangerous to dogs, it can be deadly to small children, the elderly and those with autoimmune disorders.
The affected products were distributed in 12 U.S. states.
It showed a dog dancing to music, or quite possibly, a dog scratching its back against a wall that someone had cleverly set to music. The video had been sent to me by Chris Gomez.
Then Dan, a brother to Chris, and a close personal friend of mine for 35+ years, sent me the following. This is in a different league to Saturday’s little video. This raises questions as to how the dog was trained to perform like this? How long did it take? What’s the story behind the display?
All I could discover, from the blog Sun Gazing was, “This dog dance was performed at The Open European Championships and totally blew the crowd away.”
Trust me, this is going to have you spellbound!
Enjoy!
If anyone can provide the answers to my earlier questions then Dan and I would love to hear from you.
The effect of familiarity on dog–human interactions.
Introduction
You will remember that a couple of weeks ago, Professor Marc Bekoff generously gave me permission to publish his essay Butts and Noses: Secrets and Lessons from Dog Parks. The essence of the essay being that dog parks are gold mines of information about the behavior of dogs and humans. (Post published by Marc Bekoff Ph.D. on May 16, 2015 in Animal Emotions.)
The good Professor then went on to say that I was free to republish any of his essays so long as the usual accreditations and links were provided. So yesterday, I started going through the many html links in his essay, that essay may be read here, looking for posts that would interest readers of Learning from Dogs.
Dogs and their human companions: The effect of familiarity on dog–human interactions
Andrea Kerepesi (a), Antal Dóka (a), Ádám Miklósi (b)
(a) Department of Ethology, Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary
(b) MTA-ELTE Comparative Ethology Research Group, Budapest, Hungary
It’s a very interesting piece of research. I’m going to include the Abstract in today’s post and recommend if anyone wants to read the full article that they do so here.
So here is the Abstract.
ABSTRACT
There are few quantitative examinations of the extent to which dogs discriminate between familiar and unfamiliar persons. In our study we have investigated whether dogs show differential behaviour towards humans of different degrees of familiarity (owner, familiar person, unfamiliar person). Dogs and humans were observed in eight test situations: (1) Three-way strange situation test, (2) Calling in from food, (3) Obedience test, (4) Walking away, (5) Threatening approach, (6) Playful interaction, (7) Food inhibition test and (8) Manipulation of the dog’s body.
Dogs distinguished between the owner and the two other test partners in those tests which involved separation from the owner (Test 1, 4), were aversive for the dog (Test 5) or involved playing interac- tion (Test 6). Our results revealed that the owner cannot be replaced by a familiar person in situations provoking elevated anxiety and fear.
In contrasts, dogs did not discriminate between the owner and the familiar person in those tests that were based on obedient behaviour or behaviour towards an assertive person (Tests 2, 3, 7 and 8). Dogs’ former training experience reduced the difference between their behaviour towards the owner and the familiar person in situations requiring obedience but it did not mask it totally. The dogs’ behaviour towards each of the humans participating in the tests was consistent all over the test series.
In summary, dogs discriminated between their owner and the unfamiliar person and always preferred the owner to the unfamiliar person. However, the discrimination between the owner and the familiar person is context-specific.
This article is part of a Special Issue entitled: Canine Behavior.
Learning from Dogs 