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Wolves May Be 'Re-Domesticating' Into Dogs (sciencemag.org)
sciencehabit quotes a report from Science Magazine: It happened thousands of years ago, and it may be happening again: Wolves in various parts of the world may have started on the path to becoming dogs. That's the conclusion of a new study, which finds that the animals are increasingly dining on livestock and human garbage instead of their wild prey, inching closer and closer to the human world in some places. But given today's industrialized societies, this closeness might also bring humans and wolves into more conflict, with disastrous consequences for both. To find out how gray wolves might be affected by eating more people food, Thomas Newsome, an evolutionary biologist at the Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia, and his colleagues examined studies of what's happened to other large carnivores that live close to people. Newsome's 2014 study of a dingo population in Australia's Tanami Desert showed that the wild dogs' habit of dining almost exclusively on junk food at a waste management facility had made them fat and less aggressive. They were also more likely to mate with local dogs and had become "cheeky," says Newsome, daring to run between his legs as he set out traps for them. Most intriguingly, the dumpster dingoes' population formed a genetic cluster distinct from all other dingoes -- indicating that they were becoming genetically isolated, a key step in forming a new species. Is this happening to gray wolves? The conditions are ripe for it, says Newsome, noting that human foods already make up 32% of gray wolf diets around the world. The animals now mostly range across remote regions of Eurasia and North America, yet some are returning to developed areas. The paper has been published in the journal Bioscience.
But given today's industrialized societies, this closeness might also bring humans and wolves into more conflict, with disastrous consequences for both
How could that have "disastrous" consequences for humans? If a group of wolves say inflict a few deaths on humans (nothing like the numbers from say boating accidents let alone road deaths) then the wolves will be wiped out. That may be a shame or even a tragedy but the potential disastrousness from conflict here is only for the wolves.
It happened thousands of years ago, and it may be happening again
So bark we all!
Ezekiel 23:20
and it wont result in dogs 2.0
It wasnt just proximity to humans that cause the first domestication event in wolves (or really, several parallel events), but conditions that also resulted animals with less aggression, which was then amplified by captive breeding.
this event isnt structured to provide that reduction in aggression.
but it will provide an increase in guile.
this isnt dogs 2.0
this is coyotes 2.0
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Alaska, Bears will enter a bus to eat workers lunches.
Deer, suburbs are entering their area so they have to raid what they can till captured as someone will call about them.
Yellowstone, Bears have entered cars through windows forcing people to exit while it searches for food.
One doesn't feed or allow animals to find a source of food or they will make it a habit.
There are several breeds of dog that look not much different from wolves, such as German Shepherd and Husky. People aren't greatly scared by German Shepherds in most cases. Wolves already cross-breed with domestic dogs and many people own the hybrids as pets; some people own wolves as pets.
Fear of wolves is taught or the result of an attack; it's not inherent in human nature.
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It'd called selective breeding. A group in Russia has domesticated foxes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Domesticated_Red_Fox using selective breeding. I'd guess that domestication of wolves by selective breeding would be even quicker because wolves are more social than foxes.
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The secret to producing a dog is to encourage continued juvenile behaviors; neoteny. A wolf is actually a pretty useless pet, while they are a social animal, they are high strung and unreliable. However, as likely happened the other times wolves have been domesticated, those wolves who are a little less high strung, who can form even a marginally stronger social bond with humans, will be tolerated, whereas the wilder members will either be killed or driven off. And really, it actually only takes a few generations for a canid to essentially be domesticated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Now obviously this experiment is to intentionally domesticate a canid, but the fact remains that encouraging neoteny doesn't actually seem that hard, and so long as a wolf could prove to be of some use, and is tolerated, there's at least a chance of domestication. And so far as I understand the molecular data, it suggests this has happened multiple times. As well, there is still gene flow between wild canids and domesticated dogs to suggest that the process might even be shorter these days.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
many people own the hybrids as pets; some people own wolves as pets.
The number of people killed (often including the owners) by these "domesticated" wolves likely exceeds the number killed by wild wolves. Keeping a wolf as a pet is a really bad idea. In a wild wolf pack, only the alpha male and female reproduce. So a wolf has a genetic imperative to eventually challenge the alpha, and take over the pack. If you own a wolf, you are the alpha, and one day, possibly when you are sick or injured and the wolf senses your weakness, your "pet" is going turn on you.
"Domesticated" wolves will seek opportunities to escape, and since they don't have the hunting skills of wild wolves they may be driven by hunger and lack of fear to hunt humans. Some "pet" wolves have killed dozens of people.
Good advice on wolves from XKCD.