My Friendly Pets

Humans share a great deal of their genetic makeup with chimpanzees. That would lead most people to beleive that studying chimps would be best for understanding human behavior. However, recent studies indicate that a clearer picture of human behavior can be found when studying the behavior of dogs. The social behavior we share with dogs include, but are not limited to the following: cooperation, attachment to people, understanding human verbal and nonverbal communication as well as the ability to imitate.

Very often people will speak of their dogs understanding their emotions and it is probably true. When you’re sad or perhaps crying and your dog comes to you and puts his head on your lap or shoulder or tries to lick your hand, it is probably not a coincidence. They sense the sadness we feel and are trying to show comfort which is a learned behavior. Scientists believe that since dogs and humans have cohabitated together for the past 10000 to 20000 years, many of their behaviors have become shared.

A recent paper written in part by scientist, Jozsef Topal told Discovery News the following: “that shared environment has led to the emergence of functionally shared behavioral features in dogs and humans and, in some cases, analogous underlying cognitive skills.” These cognitive skills were demonstrated through an experiment where Topal and his colleagues taught both a 16-month-old human child and mature dogs to repeat multiple actions. Some of these actions included turning around in circles, vocalizing, jumping up, jumping over a horizontal rod, putting an object into a container, carrying an object to the owner or the parent and pushing a rod to the floor. This is remarkable, and yet, not so because the dogs that we love are truly so much like our family members that we actually do behave alike!!!!

Chanel is 21 years old today and that is not in dog years!!! Yes, that’s right!!! Today Chanel is celebrating her 147 dog years by being the guest of honor at a party in Manhattan with some of her canine buddies. This is a rare outing for Chanel, who actually resides in Port Jefferson station on Long Island. The Guinness Book of Records lists Chanel as the world’s oldest dog.

Denice Shaughnessy, Chanel’s owner, says the dog is still quite independent and will definitely people know if she is not happy about something. I guess age has its benefits. Chanel, a dachshund, lost her reddish coat long ago and it has been replaced by a coat of white. She suffers many of the same ailments as her elder counterparts. Her eyes aren’t waht they used to be and now has to wear protective lenses to because of her cataracts. Also, like many older people, Chanel feels the cold in her bones but doesn’t necessarily have the means to make it down to Florida for the winters. Yes, the old girl has really slowed down. She used to run three miles a day with Shaughnessy, who adopted Chanel from a shelter in Virginia when the dog was only six weeks old.

Now if Chanel goes out for a walk, she is usually carried. However, she does enjoy some tasty meals. Whole wheat pasta with some cooked chicken is a usual meal for this wonderful dog. There are also some soft treats in store for pup as her teeth are a bit weak for chewing at this point in her life…what do you thinik…..could Chanel be around long enough to use a new set of dentures?

I spoke a couple of entries back about the mental health benefits of having a dog. It is truly amazing what a dog can do to help the psyche of their human owners.

However, dog ownership can also help their owners physically. Statistics prove that the survival rate of people who have had a heart attack is significantly increased if they own a dog. If someone who doesn’t have a dog has a heart attack, their survival rate is 1 in 15. However, dog ownership increases those chances of survival to 1 in 87. Those are pretty great odds. Also, simply having a dog lowers the risk of heart attacks occurring at all.

People who own pets generally have better health than those who don’t because having a dog means the dog has to be exercised and cared for. In doing so, the physical benefits of that exercise is carried over to the owner as well as the dog.

Having dogs in our lives can positively affect our blood pressure. It has been shown that women who are undergoing stress is lowered more by having dogs around them than friends. Perhaps that is because don’t disagree with us like friends might. Children undergoing a physical examination had lower blood pressure, decreased heart rate and less behavioral distress when there a dog was present during the exam.

In nursing homes where they have pet companion therapy programs, patients seemed to have a lower need for perscription medication and fewer minor health problems. Lower cholesterol and triglyceride levels were found in people who had dogs as opposed to those who did not.

So mentally and physically, dogs do improve our lives!!!

If you have a dog and know the sibling of that dog, does that mean that your dog will display the same behavior at its sibling? For most of us, the answer doesn’t even matter. However, when the dog is Bo, the “First Dog”, everything about him matters, even his brother, Solo. Yes, Bo has a brother and his name is Solo. Karen Douglas, who lives in Washington, DC, says her 14 month old puppy is a handful and has a chewing desire.

Bo and Solo were not from the same litter. In fact, Solo was just that, the only product of Bo’s mom and dad from their first litter. He even has the personality of an only child, always trying to get attention. According to Douglas, there is almost nothing Solo won’t try to chew on. These items include including shoes, purses, books, toilet paper, paper towels, toys that make noises and an empty two-liter soda bottle.

Solo is not a small dog, so it is entirely possible that Bo will grow bigger than his oringinal estimate of a medium sized dog. Due to his rambunctious nature, Solo has been through a great deal of training focusing on education in clicker training, obedience and agility, and is beginning to take on a retrieval sport unique to Portuguese Water Dogs known as Water Work. Perhaps Bo will need some educational training as well and without a doubt will receive all the training he needs.

Douglas said that there was something special about Solo. She commented that , “I saw a certain gleam in his eyes that said, ‘I just want to please, but no one seems to know how to talk to me.’”

i think whatever personality and crazy characteristics Bo might have in common with Solo, he will be just as loved and you can’t do better by any dog than that.

I have written quite a few entries regarding dog cloning and it is truly an amazing occurence. However, another unique cloning event has taken place the result has resulted in dogs that can glow in the dark. Yes, dogs that glow in the dark!!

The “glow in the dark” dogs were engineered in South Korea, the country that has been at the forefront of the cloning discoveries. These dogs would be the first where
transgenic dogs are carrying fluorescent genes causing their mysterious glow. In the U.S., Japan and Europe, fluorescent mice and pigs have been cloned, but this is the first time dogs have been cloned with this remarkable trait from modified genes.

At Seoul National University, professor Lee Byeong-chun, head of the research team had his team take skin cells from a beagle, inserted fluorescent genes into them and put them into eggs before implanted them into the womb of a surrogate mother, a local mixed breed. Six female beagles were born in December 2007 through a cloning with a gene that produces a red fluorescent protein that make them glow, he said. Two died, but the four others survived.

This is not simply an attempt to do something ghoulish or freaky. The cloning of these dogs through gene modification could have some great implications for finding new treatments for genetic diseases such as Parkinson’s and others.

While a glowing dog may not be what you would think you want…think of the benefits. When the dog has to go out to do its business in the middle of the night, you wouldn’t have to turn lights on outside to see the dog, as you would be able to watch their travels as they glow!!!

A recent discovery may show how truly attached an Eygptian man was to his puppy and how it was probalby planned that he spend eternity with the dog that he loved. So what was this discovery? A small bumdle was recently found at the feet of an ancient Egyptian mummy. The man’s tome was inscribed with the words Hapi-man and when examined the bundle was the remains of a young dog. This discovery, made by staff at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, is rather rare because early Eygptians often mummified cats and birds, but rarely did so with dogs. It has been determined that Hapi-Puppy is about 2300 years old and was quite young when mummified with his supposed master.

so much has been learned about the mummified remains of this dog and his owner through the use of a modern ct scan machine. The machine used at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania clearly showed the man and his beloved pet. According to Janet Monge, acting curator of the museum’s Physical “You could see its Jack Russell terrier-type legs, long head and individual toes”. This truly must have been an exciting find.

Jennifer Wegner, a senior research scientist in the museum’s Egyptian section, explained that dogs during the early Eygptian times were often depicted in drawings with dogs on a leash or sitting under chairs indicating that dogs were a very important part of the lives of the Eygtian people.

The cat scans indicated that the man who died was around 40 years old and the dog was probably killed upon his master’s death, so that they could spend eternity together mummified in that tomb. Perhaps not what would be done today, but part of the acceptable culture of Eygpt over 2000 years ago!!!