origin of the dog

Author: Laura McKinney
Date Of Creation: 2 August 2021
Update Date: 12 May 2024
Anonim
A brief history of dogs - David Ian Howe
Video: A brief history of dogs - David Ian Howe

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THE origin of the domestic dog it has been a controversial subject for centuries, full of unknowns and false myths. Although currently there are still questions to be resolved, science offers very valuable answers that help to better understand why dogs are the best pets or why, unlike wolves or cats, this species is the most domesticated.

Have you ever wondered what the origin of dogs? Discover in PeritoAnimal all about the Canis lupus familiaris, starting with the first carnivores and ending with the large number of dog breeds that exist today. If you are interested in knowing in detail the origin of the dog, don't miss this opportunity to travel to the past and understand where and how it all started.


What were the first carnivorous animals?

The first bone record of a carnivorous animal dates back to 50 million years ago, in the Eocene. This first animal was arboreal, he fed by chasing and hunting other animals smaller than himself. It was similar to a marten, but with a short snout. Therefore, these carnivorous animals divided into two groups:

  • The caniforms: canids, seals, walruses, possums, bears...
  • The felines: felines, mongooses, genets...

The separation into felines and caniforms

These two groups differ fundamentally in the internal structure of the ear and in dentition. The separation of these two groups was caused by habitat diversification. Like planet cooling, a forest mass was being lost and meadows gained space. It was then that the feliformes remained in the trees and the caniforms began to specialize in hunting prey in the meadows, since the caniforms, with few exceptions, lack retractable nails.


What is the ancestor of the dog?

To know the origin of the dog, it is necessary to go back to the first dogs that appeared in North America, since the first known canid is the Prohesperocyon, which inhabited the present area of ​​Texas 40 million years ago. This canid was the size of a raccoon but slimmer and also had longer legs than its arboreal ancestors.

The biggest recognized canid was the epicyon. With a very robust head, it was more like a lion or a hyena than a wolf. It is not known if he would be a butcher or if he would hunt in packs, like the current wolf. These animals were confined to present-day North America and date back to between 20 and 5 million years ago. They reached five feet and 150 kilos.

Origin of the dog and other canids

Twenty-five million years ago, in North America, the group was splitting, which caused the appearance of the oldest relatives of wolves, raccoons and jackals. And with the continued cooling of the planet, 8 million years ago, the Bering Strait Bridge, which allowed these groups reach Eurasia, where they would reach their highest degree of diversification. In Eurasia, the first kennels lupus it appeared only half a million years ago and, 250,000 years ago, it returned to North America across the Bering Strait.


Dog comes from the wolf?

In 1871, Charles Darwin initiated the multiple ancestor theory, which proposed that the dog descended from coyotes, wolves and jackals. However, in 1954, Konrad Lorenz dismissed the coyote as the origin of dogs and proposed that the Nordic breeds descended from the wolf and that the rest descended from the jackal.

evolution of dogs

Then the dog comes from the wolf? Currently, thanks to DNA sequencing, it has been found that the dog, the wolf, the coyote and the jackal share DNA sequences and that the most similar to each other are the DNA of the dog and the wolf. A study published in 2014[1] guarantees that the dog and the wolf belong to the same species, but that they are different subspecies. It is estimated that dogs and wolves can have a common ancestor, but there are no conclusive studies.

Find out which dogs look like wolves in this PeritoAnimal article.

Humans and Dogs: First Encounters

When 200,000 years ago the first humans left Africa and arrived in Europe, the canids were already there. They lived together as competitors for a long period until they started their association approximately 30,000 years ago.

genetic studies date the first dogs 15 thousand years ago, in the Asian area that corresponds to present-day China, coinciding with the beginning of agriculture. Recent Surveys 2013 Swedish University of Uppsala [2] claim that the domestication of the dog was linked to genetic differences between wolf and dog, associated with the development of the nervous system and starch metabolism.

When the first farmers established themselves, producing high-energy starchy foods, canid opportunistic groups approached the human settlements, consuming the vegetable residues rich in starch. These first dogs were also less aggressive than wolves, which facilitated domestication.

THE starchy diet it was essential for the species to thrive, since the genetic variations suffered by these dogs made it impossible for them to survive on the exclusively carnivorous diet of their ancestors.

The packs of dogs obtained food from the village and, therefore, defended the territory of other animals, a fact that benefited human beings. We could then say that this symbiosis allowed an approximation between both species, which culminated in the domestication of the dog.

Dog domestication

THE Coppinger's theory claims that 15,000 years ago, canids approached villages in search of easy food. It may have happened, then, that the most docile and confident specimens they were more likely to access food than those who distrusted humans. Thus, the wild dogs more sociable and docile had more access to resources, which led to greater survival and resulted in new generations of docile dogs. This theory dismisses the idea that it was man who first approached the dog with the intention of taming it.

Origin of dog breeds

Currently, we know more than 300 dog breeds, some of them standardized. This is due to the fact that, in the late 19th century, Victorian England began to develop the eugenics, science that studies genetics and aims to species improvement. The definition of the SAR [3] is as follows:

From Fr. eugenics, and this one from gr. εὖ me 'well and -genesis '-genesis'.

1. f. Med. Study and application of biological inheritance laws aimed at improving the human species.

Each race has certain morphological characteristics that make it unique, and breeders throughout history have combined behavioral and temperamental characteristics to develop new races that could provide humans with one or another utility. A genetic study of more than 161 races points to Basenji as the oldest dog in the world, from which all the dog breeds we know today developed.

Eugenics, fashions and changes in the standards of different breeds have made beauty a determining factor in current dog breeds, leaving aside the well-being, health, character or morphological consequences they can cause. .

Find out on PeritoAnimal how dog breeds have changed with photos from before and now.

Other failed attempts

Remains of dogs other than wolves have been found in Central Europe, belonging to failed attempts to domesticate wolves during the last glacial period, between 30 and 20 thousand years ago. But it was not until the beginning of agriculture that the domestication of the first group of dogs has become something in fact palpable. We hope this article has provided interesting facts about the earliest origins of canids and early carnivores.