It’s Rocket Raccoon’s long lost relative. We need a Tony Stark designed fully functioning time-space GPS. Where’s the ugly brown van parked?
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It took 2 weeks to receive my dog’s ancestry results from a kit available online. It defies logic that researchers with sophisticated methods do not know the genetic origins of this pup after almost 2 years.
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This is amazing, but it stings to know that these discoveries are being revealed because the permafrost is melting due to global warming.
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"And male wolves participate in pup raising, while male dogs generally avoid it."
I wonder if the comparison is valid, since domesticated dogs don't often live in the wild as wolves do.
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@polymath The comparison was with "dogs," not "domesticated dogs."
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The late Raymond Coppinger did a great deal of seminal research on the domestication of the dog during his long tenure at Hampshire College, and wrote a number of popular-science books on the subject. There are many differences both in innate behaviors and physiology between the modern wolf and the modern dog. Coppinger posited that dogs essentially domesticated themselves, and the world-wide camp-follower pariah dog is the purest form of what the wolf became. Anything written by Ray is worth reading.
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Exciting and amazing find!
A little easy trivia to quickly distinguish modern domestic dogs and their wild canine cousins in addition to those mentioned. Our pets have some kind of a curve to their tail, whether slight or tight. All undomesticated canine groups have straight tails. Therefore, if you see an animal in a movie that is called a wolf, but the tail has a slight curve, you may be sure it is a hybrid (part wolf, part dog) and therefore better suited to be trained for the part while still looking the part.
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@Ann James Massey A lot of times, they actually have to CG the tail of the trained wolf-dogs used in movies because they have a tendency to wag with happiness that they're doing a good job acting, even if they're supposed to be acting scary!
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