Sister Snog

Did anyone see The Secret Life of the Dog this week on BBC2? It was amazing! I know that SisterSnogger loves me and I love her but what I didn't realise was why the bond was so strong. Apparently it's all to do with the same amazing hormone that bonds a mother to her baby.

There was an incredible dog on the programme called Betsy who had an understanding of over 340 human words (about the same as a young  child). SisterSnogger says I can manage 3. What she doesn't know is that I actually know loads more. I just choose to ignore her. The other thing we can do is to recognise human gestures, such as pointing. Even chimpanzees can't do that and they're supposed to be next in the intelligence line to humans. I don't think so...

There was also an interesting experiment on nature vs nurture. You may be aware that we dogs are 99.8% wolf. At least that's what our DNA tells the experts. However over the course of thousands of years we've become domesticated and rarely harp back to our canis lupus days. The programmers gave 5 day old wolf cubs to a group who had previously raised 5 day old puppies to see how the wolf cubs would react to being raised in the same way as the puppies. In the very early days there was very little to distinguish them. Until the wolf cubs started to find their independence. And boy did they ever. One cub-carer couldn't even open her fridge door without the wolf cub leaping in to steal any food it could get its jaws into. I know what would happen here if I tried that one...

The best thing of all though for you humans is that we're now helping you to identify genes responsible for human diseases. So mother nature's a wonderful thing isn't she? Now when's the next full moon for me to howl at?