Why dog is not a wolf in disguise

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Dogs had years and years of evolution to become a different species from wolves. I find it unfair for both of the species to keep comparing them according to the leader of the pack belief.

Wolf pack living in the wild is based on family relation. Parents play leading roles in providing for the pack. In contrary to common believe aggression between them is very uncommon. So where did this confusion that is going around in the dog world came from?

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First observations of wolf packs were conducted in the zoo environment. Those wolves were unrelated and they didn’t have any other choice than to live in close proximity. That not only forced them to create a pack with individuals that they wouldn’t normally live with, it also created a tremendous amount of stress. It’s not uncommon to see a change in behaviour in all living creatures with a high level of stress for a prolonged period of time.

As the bestselling author of Dog Sense, John Bradshaw said in his interview: “the studies of West Bengal feral dogs don’t offer the slightest shred of evidence that they are constantly motivated to assume leadership of the pack within which they live, as the old-fashioned wolf-pack theory would have it.”

I believe that the way to learn more about dogs is to study dogs that we have in our households. Fortunately, more and more scientists are doing just that. One of the greatest examples is ORCA, a not-for-profit student organization advised by Dr. Jesús Rosales-Ruiz. Their mission is “to enhance the lives of animals and their guardians through behavior analytic research and to inform the public about these discoveries”. Their publications are a great source of knowledge. It brings hope that soon people will realise that there are different ways to look at dogs.

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With the widespread of the Internet, we can now learn online. The barriers to getting this knowledge go down and people are starting to look for information more often. I will continue to provide content for everyone who loves to learn more and is not settling on the status quo.

You can be a superhero for your dog – he will love you for it!

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