Dogs And "pack" Theory

[Just Midol]

Hey Erny

There was some belief that dogs derived from either Coyotes or Jackals (this was mentioned in the seminar), however from memory the DNA of both was quite removed from the dog's. It is the wolf DNA which is indistinguishable from the that of the dogs, which holds strong argument that the wolf IS the ancient ancestor of the dog.

Question from me!

Did he (or do you know of anyone) believe that some breeds of dogs evolved from different species of wolves? Does he take into account that some breeds (like mine) have probably been crossed with wolves fairly recently.

I remember reading a study a while ago on ancient dog breeds, they worked out which dogs could be considered ancient by how much of their DNA matches wolves. Naturally, sibes were very, very high. They said this could be because sibes were recently crossed with wolves. Couldn't this mean that some breeds of dogs will have more natural wolf behaviours than others?

Also, I'm sure you've seen the movie 8 below. That was based on a true story, the dogs all stayed together. Doesn't this in some way prove that dogs can and do form packs?

*I might have my movie names muddled up, I mean the one where they leave the dogs behind.

Edited December 19, 2008 by Lord Midol

[BJean]

I think much depends on how you define pack -

do hyenas function and hunt as a pack?

They're also one of the biggest free loader scavengers on the continent

what about lions, do they live in packs?

Is the definition of 'pack' how an animal hunts or why it hunts -

who/what defined the boundaries of what constitutes a pack?

Like any theory / or legal document how you define the boundaries and parameters of key words, influences not only how a theory / document is to be understood -

but it also tells you a lot about the philosophical platform from which it was engendered.

Langauge can be cleverly repackaged - I am not sure from what I have read of ray

that he is purporting anything significantly different

other than setting parameters for what he thinks is pack, and then going on with creation from there.

Why groups of feral town dogs are referred to as a point of references, I don't know

Already they share their territory with humans and therefore to a certain extent consider humans as part of their environmental hierachy.

All animals have environmental hierachy - but I guess that depends on how you define environmental hierachy

LGDs that patrol open range will hunt and obtain their own food - what keeps them with the stock is not just a need for survival of the self -

otherwise they would not follow the herd, nor protect them from danger, nor refrain from eating the yummy ones when they get hungry.

Incidently this is what makes a shiite LGD - the ones that eat the stock when no one is watching

ie: the LGD whose sense of pack is less engrained than others. (nb: what turns a lion into a rogue lion ie one that kills both female and males of its species and does not form a lion pack?)

I do think that some dogs/breed have less instinct for pack than others

but it does not mean I have to redefine 'pack' in hunting terms only and conclude that technically 'pack' is not corect to use when referrng to dogs.

Before any species can do anything together - their must be some kind of organizational structure in place.

Ray imo has focused only one of the reasons this organisational structure exists.

Social behaviours have and do evolve depending on the niche environment (as do physical characteristics), but to pack is merely a developmental process to a specific habitat. The early protodog did not pack as there was no reason for it to and was not beneficial to it's existence. This flowed on to our domestic dog today. As you said, they wait for food to come to them. Since "packing" is not genetic behaviour it would be unfair and incorrect to term our dogs as "pack animals" who display "pack behaviours". Therefore whilst various behaviours have evoled either to accommodate the environment or by way of artificial selection, I believe our dogs do not and will not show any form of true pack behaviour (altered or not) in their existence today.

Edited December 19, 2008 by lilli

[Nekhbet]

actually Africa have their own range of wild canids that range from pack hunters to scavengers - so the felids are not the only hunting force in Africa.

* Side-striped jackal........(Canis adustus)

* Golden jackal....... (Canis aureus)

* Black-backed jackal ........ (Canis mesomelas)

* Ethiopian wolf ...... (Canis simensis)

* African wild dog .......(Lycaon pictus)

* Bat-eared fox.......(Otocyon megalotis)

* Cape fox ....... (Vulpes chama)

* Pale fox....... (Vulpes pallida)

* Rüppell's fox....... (Vulpes rueppellii)

* Fennec fox....... (Vulpes zerda)

There is always a place for the canids, every continent has (or had until we wiped them out) them in one form or another.

Oh and slightly OT but how is this for convergent evolution?

South America - Maned Wolf

African Hunting Dog

notice both are fine structure, long legged, large ears - one is south american the other is african

[BJean]

South America - Maned Wolf

African Hunting Dog

notice both are fine structure, long legged, large ears - one is south american the other is african

beautiful postcards from nature

[BJean]

Okay, for those of you who were curious in my new beliefs into “pack” existence of the dog, here is a very brief account of how it goes. This information is based on the 3 day seminar I recently attended at Wolf Park (US) with Biologist and Ethologist, Prof. Ray Coppinger.

In order for the information to flow and so that you guys get the full picture of where it all heads, I will need to start from the start….I mean the very start….the domestication of the dog!

I’ll start during the Neolithic period around 4000 to 2200BC (late stone age): wolves with genetic high avoidance thresholds (ie genetically less fearful) scavenged around the rubbish dumps of the newly settled and developed villages. I start with this period purely because this was when the changes to the wolf started to occur, however wolves would scavenge from the nomadic Mesolithic era people (middle stone age) before that.

Ok back to Neolithic times…..over the next number of generations, these wolves began to morph in size i.e. becoming smaller animals with leaner body masses in order to accommodate/adapt to their new niche environments. This was probably due to the fact that their original large body mass size was not conducive to survival in this new environment, therefore only those animals with the ability to adapt survived. Please do not mistake this for “survival of the fittest” as this is not what this is about. It was more a case of “survival of the most adaptive”....fitness had nothing to do with it. There were many “fit” wolves, but with genetically low avoidance thresholds, who survived quite well doing what they did but they never evolved into a different animal. This is explained in Ray's "benefit/cost" ratio element and he proves Darwin’s theory of wolf/dog domestication as being incorrect. Even Konrad Lorenz himself when visited by Ray Coppinger years ago stated...”everything I ever wrote about dog domestication is wrong”.

These morphing wolves no longer needed to hunt for food since it was available in abundance from the dumps, although that is not to say that they lost all ability to hunt. From the village rubbish dumps, they ate left over animal carcasses, human feces as well as their own (which is where our dogs get copraphagia tendencies from). The “wolves” were now becoming scavengers and searched for food around the dumps to feed themselves, not hunting in a pack formation as the rest of the other wolves continued to do.

Finally over a few more generations (?number unknown), the village dog was formed (ie very early Proto-dog, and very likely, the ancestor of our domestic dogs today) I will refer to these as P-dogs for carpotunnel’s sake.

These village p-dogs dogs were now true scavengers and continued to hang around the village rubbish dumps to feed. There they also mated, had their litters etc etc. But they did not “pack”, rather a loose community if you like who hung around together and survived thanks to the villagers.

To understand that this is NOT a pack is to understand that to Pack is to get together for the hunt. Any animal that hunts for food for survival “packs” together to chase and bring down the prey and consume it. Our modern day dogs do not hunt for their food, therefore they do not scientifically “pack”. They do, however, still retain hunting motor patterns (prey drives), although drastically altered from breed to breed due to artificial selection from humans. The original P-dog retained all of its hunting motor patterns, but after settling into their new environments, no longer had any use for them.

i read a lot of sweeping assumptions in the above about how mankind lived and evolved -

not all humans lived in villages

there were humans who lived an isolated nomadic existence without villages and pdogs from dumpsters

and I don't even have to remain in BC, we can leap forward to AD.

ray and his pdogs seem plausible in more moderate and 'modern' environments

but in areas where there were long harsh winters -20 - 40C, high mountains - where environments did not sustain human life all year around -

i don't see pdogs and their evolution as described above

(I hope 'pdogs' doesn't become the new buzz word when newly trained dog trainers are explaining to their clients why the theory of 'pack' is archaic - when ye olde dogmen didn't know any better )

Edited December 19, 2008 by lilli

[Nekhbet]

(I hope 'pdogs' doesn't become the new buzz word when newly trained dog trainers are explaining to their clients why the theory of 'pack' is archaic - when ye olde dogmen didn't know any better smile.gif )

I thinks its going to become a degree soon ... with all the 'terms', theories and such you'll spend more time with your nose buried in a book then training dogs.

It can never replace personal, good old hands on experience though frankly I know what counts for more.

[SkySoaringMagpie]

(I hope 'pdogs' doesn't become the new buzz word when newly trained dog trainers are explaining to their clients why the theory of 'pack' is archaic - when ye olde dogmen didn't know any better smile.gif )

I thinks its going to become a degree soon ... with all the 'terms', theories and such you'll spend more time with your nose buried in a book then training dogs.

It can never replace personal, good old hands on experience though frankly I know what counts for more.

The difficulty is that at the moment a lot of what is out there on pack behaviour is sheer pop psychology and it's eaten up because humans love, love, love hierarchy (particularly where they are at the top).

Sure, ultimately you have to deal with the dog in front of you, but it helps if your brain is not full of either Ye Olde Crappe or Shiny New Crap 2.0. Good critical thinking and research skills shouldn't be underestimated or devalued, but as you say, you need hands on experience as well.

[anthony mazzeri]

Did he (or do you know of anyone) believe that some breeds of dogs evolved from different species of wolves? Does he take into account that some breeds (like mine) have probably been crossed with wolves fairly recently.

I remember reading a study a while ago on ancient dog breeds, they worked out which dogs could be considered ancient by how much of their DNA matches wolves. Naturally, sibes were very, very high. They said this could be because sibes were recently crossed with wolves. Couldn't this mean that some breeds of dogs will have more natural wolf behaviours than others?

The visual evidence would back this up. Knowing that dogs 5,000 years ago already looked like Dingoes, you'd have to assume that those dog breeds which resemble wolves would either have had to have been isolated from other dog breeds for thousands of years to keep their wolf lineage intact, or have been recently cross-bred with wolves to reintroduce the genes.

There are no wolves in South East Asia and Australia where the Dingoes are, but there are (or were) wolves where the wolf-like dog breeds hail from such as Scandinavia and the European Wolf.

From what I've read of dog-wolf hybrids, it takes several generations to breed the wolf wildness back out of them again, which would indicate it would have been a concerted breeding program over time instead of a one-off accidental mating. And the need to continue to breed the offspring back with 'normal' dogs over the generations to dilute the wolf blood would also indicate that they are separate and different enough that the original neolithic dog ancestors weren't wolves but a relative to them as they still are today, ie dogs didn't evolve from wolves, but they both evolved from a now extinct common ancestor and then went their separate ways after that. Until crossed back together by humans at any rate.

[Kavik]

Interestingly Midol, crossing with wolves comes up in his book, in a section you would be very interested in. To do with sled dogs. Can't remember exactly what was said (will look it up if you like) but someone did cross Huskies with wolves to try to make a better sled dog and what they ended up with was not a good sled dog - skittish, etc and not as good a worker as the Huskies.

I don't think all breeds that look 'wolfish' are closer in behaviour to wolves than other dogs. I like breeds that have a 'natural', wolfish look but I also like the ones that are biddable and good sports prospects. So GSDs, Belgian Shepherds, Kelpies etc which have that look do not have a wolfish temperament (which would be more standoffish, not biddable etc).

[jesomil]

Lots of great thought provoking stuff in this thread .

[arawnhaus]

Great post lili. My thoughts are In keeping with this.

I think much depends on how you define pack -

do hyenas function and hunt as a pack?

They're also one of the biggest free loader scavengers on the continent

what about lions, do they live in packs?

Is the definition of 'pack' how an animal hunts or why it hunts -

who/what defined the boundaries of what constitutes a pack?

Like any theory / or legal document how you define the boundaries and parameters of key words, influences not only how a theory / document is to be understood -

but it also tells you a lot about the philosophical platform from which it was engendered.

Langauge can be cleverly repackaged - I am not sure from what I have read of ray

that he is purporting anything significantly different

other than setting parameters for what he thinks is pack, and then going on with creation from there.

Why groups of feral town dogs are referred to as a point of references, I don't know

Already they share their territory with humans and therefore to a certain extent consider humans as part of their environmental hierachy.

All animals have environmental hierachy - but I guess that depends on how you define environmental hierachy

LGDs that patrol open range will hunt and obtain their own food - what keeps them with the stock is not just a need for survival of the self -

otherwise they would not follow the herd, nor protect them from danger, nor refrain from eating the yummy ones when they get hungry.

Incidently this is what makes a shiite LGD - the ones that eat the stock when no one is watching

ie: the LGD whose sense of pack is less engrained than others. (nb: what turns a lion into a rogue lion ie one that kills both female and males of its species and does not form a lion pack?)

I do think that some dogs/breed have less instinct for pack than others

but it does not mean I have to redefine 'pack' in hunting terms only and conclude that technically 'pack' is not corect to use when referrng to dogs.

Before any species can do anything together - their must be some kind of organizational structure in place.

Ray imo has focused only one of the reasons this organisational structure exists.

Social behaviours have and do evolve depending on the niche environment (as do physical characteristics), but to pack is merely a developmental process to a specific habitat. The early protodog did not pack as there was no reason for it to and was not beneficial to it's existence. This flowed on to our domestic dog today. As you said, they wait for food to come to them. Since "packing" is not genetic behaviour it would be unfair and incorrect to term our dogs as "pack animals" who display "pack behaviours". Therefore whilst various behaviours have evoled either to accommodate the environment or by way of artificial selection, I believe our dogs do not and will not show any form of true pack behaviour (altered or not) in their existence today.

[WoofnHoof]

Hey Erny

There was some belief that dogs derived from either Coyotes or Jackals (this was mentioned in the seminar), however from memory the DNA of both was quite removed from the dog's. It is the wolf DNA which is indistinguishable from the that of the dogs, which holds strong argument that the wolf IS the ancient ancestor of the dog.

Question from me!

Did he (or do you know of anyone) believe that some breeds of dogs evolved from different species of wolves? Does he take into account that some breeds (like mine) have probably been crossed with wolves fairly recently.

I remember reading a study a while ago on ancient dog breeds, they worked out which dogs could be considered ancient by how much of their DNA matches wolves. Naturally, sibes were very, very high. They said this could be because sibes were recently crossed with wolves. Couldn't this mean that some breeds of dogs will have more natural wolf behaviours than others?

Also, I'm sure you've seen the movie 8 below. That was based on a true story, the dogs all stayed together. Doesn't this in some way prove that dogs can and do form packs?

*I might have my movie names muddled up, I mean the one where they leave the dogs behind.

I don't think that the reason for the similarities between wolves and sibes is due to a recent crossing but more due to the fact that they haven't lost as many wolf traits as other breeds have. As far as other species of wolf being involved, as far as I am aware it is the gray wolf which shares it's DNA with dogs and is able to interbreed, hence why dogs are now classified as the species canis lupus (as are gray wolves).

I am quite happy to agree with domestic dogs evolving from the one species of wolf as there has been plenty of time for the morphology to change as significantly as it has. When you introduce a strong selector like selective breeding then you get vast changes within a very short spaces of time. The only reason dogs haven't changed as significantly in recent times is due to people breeding to one type rather than experimenting agressively as would have been the case in times past. You only have to look at crossbreeds to get an idea of the range of morphologies that can be exhibited.

Interestingly Midol, crossing with wolves comes up in his book, in a section you would be very interested in. To do with sled dogs. Can't remember exactly what was said (will look it up if you like) but someone did cross Huskies with wolves to try to make a better sled dog and what they ended up with was not a good sled dog - skittish, etc and not as good a worker as the Huskies.

I don't think all breeds that look 'wolfish' are closer in behaviour to wolves than other dogs. I like breeds that have a 'natural', wolfish look but I also like the ones that are biddable and good sports prospects. So GSDs, Belgian Shepherds, Kelpies etc which have that look do not have a wolfish temperament (which would be more standoffish, not biddable etc).

It was suggested in the study that I refered to in my other post that breeds which have been bred back to the 'wolfish' appearance did not in turn bring back some all of the wolf behaviours, so your thinking is consistent with what was observed.

Here is the link to the abstract, I will keep looking for the full text I have it so it must have been available free somewhere.

Abstract:

Many of the structural modifications of modern breeds of domestic dog, Canis familiaris can be explained by changes in the rate of development, during domestication from the wolf, C. lupus These changes have been dominated by paedomorphosis, or underdevelopment, so that the adult passes through fewer growth stages and resembles a juvenile stage of its ancestor. In this paper the effects of these processes on the signalling ability of 10 breeds selected for their degree of physical dissimilarity to the wolf are examined. The number of ancestral dominant and submissive behaviour patterns used during signalling within single-breed groups ranged from two (Cavalier King Charles spaniel) to 15 (Siberian husky), and this correlated positively with the degree to which the breed physically resembles the wolf, as assessed by a panel of 14 dog behaviour counsellors. When the signals displayed by each breed were grouped according to the stage of wolf development in which they first appear, those breeds with the smallest repertoires were found to draw most of their signals from those appearing before 20 days of age in the wolf, suggesting that physical paedomorphism has been accompanied by behavioural paedomorphism.

Paedomorphosis affects agonistic visual signals of domestic dogs

Authors: GOODWIN D.; BRADSHAW J.W.S.; WICKENS S.M.

Source: Animal Behaviour, Volume 53, Number 2, February 1997 , pp. 297-304(08)

Publisher: Academic Press

Link

It's a really interesting study I would like to see one done on all breeds rather than just 10, it would be very interesting. As it is this paper made me understand why sometimes my chi and sibe get their wires crossed!

edit: stuffed up my quotes

edit 2: Found the full text here

Edited December 20, 2008 by tkay

[WoofnHoof]

sorry bit OT but I found some more interesting links on the origin of dog breeds:

From wolf to dog: visible phenotypical diversity of dog breeds

Unequal contribution of sexes in the origin of dog breeds

[Just Midol]

Hmmm.

Tkay, your posts are basically reninforcing what I already believed, that pack drive is related to the breed of dog. Some breeds have it, some don't. Obviously individual variations within each breed.

Kavik, recent for me was further back than that Sibes used to be let lose, to fend on their own through summer (I think) so they had to be able to survive as a group & hunt. It was in this period that afaik, they were reintroducing the wolf. Don't ask me where I read that though as I really have no idea. It's possible I imagined it.

[Kelpie-i]

OT: does any know how I can attach a word document to this forum? Or if anyone has an alternative program for uploading images rather than Fobotbucket which isn't working for me at the mo.??

I have some DNA results stuff that I wish to put up for you guys.

[Nekhbet]

do you have an image embedded in the word document

[Kelpie-i]

Yes, Ray's powerpoint is on PDF so I "print screened" that page onto a word document. There are about 3 pages of the DNA stuff I wish to put up.

[Nekhbet]

if you print screen you are better saving them as a JPEG file - email it to my address below and I can post them for you if you like my photobucket is working

Edited December 20, 2008 by Nekhbet

[Kelpie-i]

if this was true then how do we explain the proliferation of feral dogs in Australia? Dogs are not such weak creatures we believe them to be they are a lot tougher then I think many give them credit for. I think genetic disease and encumbering shapes would be the first to die as we have bred them to be mildly 'human lifestyle dependant' but quite a few would survive.

Hey Nekhbet, you may have missed my correction on one of the previous pages re this statement. I should read: "In short, except in rare instances, if all dogs were to die, human life would not be threatened, whereas if all humans died, the domestic dog could not surivive in its present form"

A

hunting behaviour can be quite complex (such as herding behaviours) and I don't think can be classified as a hard-wired behaviour,

tkay, motor patterns (drive sequences and/or hunting behaviour) are intrinsic behaviours in a dog. The predatory (motor pattern) sequence is only seen in its complete state by wild hunting canids. What we humans have done is selected dogs that display either some of most of these sequence patterns to create various breeds, dependant on the type of work we wanted accomplished. The motor pattern sequence is a behaviour RULE and is hard wired, although which aspects of the sequence a particular breed will display is dependant on what I just explained.

Nekhbet will be putting up an image for me (thanks Nekhbet ) which will show the artificially selected (by humans) motor patterns sequences for various breeds of dog.

[Nekhbet]

the domestic dog could not surivive in its present form"

I just need a clarification on what they mean by in its present form? pure definable breeds or are they talking about personality.