Throughout the history of evolution there have been many different methods and ideologies that have affected the gene pools and phenotypes of species, one of those being "Artificial Selection". Artificial Selection is when humans breed animals of the same species together to create a specific overall trait. (Wikipedia, Learner.org, 2010) A great example of artificial selection is the history of dog breeding. Throughout history humans have bred dogs to further develop more ideal physical and behavioral characteristics, and through it we achieved this wide range of different domesticated dog breeds that are very different from their ancestors, both physically and behavioral.
There are many theories obtaining to how dog breeding began. One of the most popular ones being that humans would rescue orphaned wolf puppies and nurse them back to health. As the puppies got nursed back to heath, they would then grow accustomed to living with humans. From there humans would use them for hunting companions, pest control and “guard dogs”. (Dogtime, 2009) Eventually humans would see that certain individuals were better for certain tasks than others. For instance one individual that was a very fast runner, but rarely barked made for a good hunting companion. However, another that wasn't good at running, but would bark at strangers made for a good guard dog. People would see these characteristics and would specifically breed individuals to concentrate certain traits, Such as breeding two dark-haired wolves to get dark-haired offspring, or two large and intimidating wolves to get large intimidating offspring. With these specific breeds being created, the offspring of the various pairings would either have very similar characteristics between one a...
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...helped widen the gene pool within the species. Through it we not only made domesticated dog breeds very different from their ancestors both physically and behavioral, but also within all the different breeds. It gave the species diversity that it never would have created on its own naturally in the wild.
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Every year an estimated 4.5 million dog bites occur in the U.S. BSL (Breed Specific Legislation) is a law that suggests that certain breeds are more prone to aggression than others. By banning or restricting the breeds in question, it is believed to help reduce the number of attacks. BSL determines which breeds are dangerous using statistics. These statistics cannot be relied on for two reasons. One, there is no concrete method to determine a dog’s pedigree. Thus, a victim, animal control officer, or owner is trusted with identifying the dog through appearance. According to Scott and Fuller, authors of Genetics and the Social Behavior of the Dog, “It has been known for decades that the cross-bred offspring of purebred dogs of different breeds often bear little or no resemblance to either their sires or dams (1965).” Visual assessments are questionable. Two, population is not accounted for. Population is important, in that it provides context to percentages. Because a dog’s breed is impossible to pinpoint, we cannot provide numbers. BSL’s cause is rendered useless when we consider these points.
Dogs are seen as an ‘evolutionary miracle’. This is because, over 100 years, they have the most breeds and changes than any other species. They have changed spectacularly from their ancestors the wolves; they domesticated themselves into dogs and they now carry many different traits. Wolves now have little use for us unlike dogs, for example, retrievers are bred to chase and then bring back
Just as humans have a family tree, so do dogs. Most if not all dogs heritage connects in some way back to the wolf. Then why are dogs domesticated, why are they best friend to man? Any wild animal can be tamed eventually through out the generations and the Chukchi people had learned that trick long ago. They became best friend to the Siberian Husky until someone got in the way, Russia. Russia tried to take over the home of the Chukchi people, Northeaster Asia, but found that the climate was much more dangerous than they though. So instead they forced the Chukchi people to open trade with them. Unknowingly they spread many diseases to the Chukchi people that they had no immunity to, many Chukchi people died. The...
The history of breeding purebred can be traced back to a long time ago. The culture of purebred dogs is also abundant such as purebred dog beauty competition and purebred dog club. However, why people are so fond of purebred dogs? According to statistics, the major reason that people like purebred dogs is that purebred dogs are beautiful and adorable. Another reason may be that some people subconsciously feel that purebred dog is the best. Some other people buy purebred dogs because they want to show their identity. Moreover, there are also some people seize this opportunity to breed purebred and sell in order to make money. Breeding purebred is not wrong, but some people inbreed purebred dogs results purebred dogs suffer serious genetic disease. This is the problem. Perhaps, many ...
Take a moment and picture a dog in your head. What do you see? You may see many different things depending on your own personal encounters with the species. There are many types of dogs out there. Some small, some large, long-haired or short-haired. There are many variances in what a dog can look like. One thing that does not change, or should not change, is the importance for every dog in this world to be given love and affection, no matter its characteristics. This is what leads me to believe that the obsession with producing and owning purebreds needs to come to a halt. Continuing to create these so-called “best dogs” is dangerous to not only the purebred’s health, but also devalues mixed breeds and can cost them their lives in animal shelters where they may never escape. My interest in this topic caused me to look into seeing what other people felt about it.
Throughout the world there are many different countries that contain diverse cultures, religions, and life styles. There is however certain aspects within these countries and cultures that acts as a common ground between one another. One dominant aspect is the existence of dogs within these cultures. Dogs are common throughout the world, either as a domestic pet, a protector on a farm, or an assistant for hunting; amongst others. Regardless of the reason for having a dog most people have either owned one for themselves or has known somebody who has owned one at some point in their life. Despite the relative normality of having a dog in your life in one way or another, the reasons for dogs coming into existence is not common knowledge among most people. Throughout a great portion of mankind’s history dogs have been an essential part of life. The truth is dogs were actually created in part by man. It was evolution from wolves in the form of natural and artificial selection that brought dogs into existence (Harris 3). This is the most modern and widely excepted theory at this time, however this was not always the case considering the theory of evolution in of itself is relatively new in our society. After evolution as a theory was accepted there were several other variations on the theory such as, the evolution being from jackals opposed to wolves, and artificial selection being the only form of evolution to have taken place. According to Jarret A Lobell and Eric A Powell of Archaeology magazine “The idea that dogs were domesticated from jackals was long ago discarded in favor of the notion that dogs descend from the gray wolf (2)”. As for the theory that artificial selection ...
Hybrid dogs became popular mostly in the last century, when breeders began experimenting with cross breeding different breeds. The term hybrid means something that is made by combining two different elements. In this case, hybrid dogs are made by taking the good characteristics of different breeds and combining them to make one cross breed that includes traits from both parents. People have since started calling these dogs “designer dogs”. A designer dog is defined as a cross between two purebred dogs. Being a purebred dog means that each puppy born has the same characteristics as one another. The difference between designer dogs and mutts is that a designer dog has a documented history, and a mutt’s ancestry is unknown.
However, the hunters would not keep all of the wolves that grew up from the cubs they had. Keeping a wolf that became overly aggressive towards them, or if it had little practical use, would have been both pointless and dangerous to their group. They most likely would have killed those types of wolves or left them behind to fend for themselves. The hunters would have chosen semi-tame wolves and those with the most desirable traits and abilities and bred the two together, repeating the process until what resembled a dog today. The first bones found which ...
It turned out that dogs could also guard sheep, and help to herd the sheep when you were moving them from one pasture to another. Some people ate dogs, especially in China. You might think of those dogs as a great way to turn garbage into food. Even in places where people usually didn't eat dogs, like Europe, dogs provided an emergency source of food when there was a famine. If you were starving, you had to kill and eat the village's dogs before they decided to eat you (and then there would be a lot more rats than usual, without the dogs to eat them, and you would live on the rats for a
This chapter covers the variations of selection. Selection is a process, a description of how genes that produce better adaptations become more frequent over time. Species don’t try to adapt to their environment. Adaptation to the environment is inevitable if a species has the right kind of genetic variation. (pg. 117) The thought that “everything happens by chance” is essentially wrong. Evolution by selection is a combination of randomness and lawfulness. First a “random” process is the occurrence of mutations that generate an array of genetic variants, both good and bad; and then a “lawful” process (natural selection) that creates these variations. (pg.118) DNA is random, and this shows in humans and animals. For example, a humans parents
This process is seen mostly in agriculture. It is because of artificial selection that we have the domesticated plants and livestock that we eat. In the case of canines, they were originally bred to become working and hunting dogs in agriculture. Later on they were bred as companion animals. The different variations of domesticated dog will be discussed later. The down fall of artificial selection is that it decreases variation in a species. Pure bred dog are highly susceptible to many different disorders and disease because of the lack of variation in their genotype. With these two processes, today we have friendly canine
The transition to the diet of the original dog as a result of beginning the relationship with humans could be attributed to the changes identified between the modern dog and original dog (wolf). The canids remain recovered in yet cave, in Belgium where Upper Paleolithic artifacts were discovered along with other object are considered to be domesticated dogs. The domestication of dog could have been driven by human need for help with herding, hunting, and early warning while the dog benefited from companionship and reliable source of food
...and weight of the male Labrador Retrievers range from (40 to 45 kg) female Labrador Retrievers range (36 kg to 40 kg), and a long coat, science helps us to attain this goal by selective breeding program which may include 20 to 25 generations to get these domesticated specific breeds. . Science also helps us to achieve the task by continuously consulting with paleontologists to research the skeletal structure of dogs and compare the existing bone and body structure to previous breeds. In this regard, Associations have established strict rules and regulations for breeding as well as created a way to unify all breeders in a wide-ranging system in order to promote healthfulness and reward breeders who consistently produce specifically heavier, taller and with longer life span puppies for this purpose by adopting crossbred lines and standardized breeding practice
Many scientists in the past, such as Aristotle and Plato, believed that there were no changes in populations; however, other scientists, such as Darwin and Wallace, arose and argued that species inherit heritable traits from common ancestors and environmental forces drives out certain heritable traits that makes the species better suited to survive or be more “fit” for that environment. Therefore, species do change over a period of time and they were able to support their theory by showing that evolution does occur. There were four basic mechanisms of evolution in their theory: mutation, migration, genetic drift, and natural selection. Natural selection is the gradual process by which heritable traits that makes it more likely for an organism to survive and successfully reproduce increases, whereas there is a decline in those who do have those beneficial heritable traits (Natural Selection). For example, there is a decrease in rain which causes a drought in the finches’ environment. The seeds in the finches’ environment would not be soft enough for the smaller and weaker beak finches to break; therefore, they cannot compete with the larger and stronger beak finches for food. The larger and stronger beak finches has a heritable trait that helps them survive and reproduce better than others for that particular environment which makes them categorized under natural selection (Freeman, 2002).
I was in a local pet store buying food for my cat when I started discussing my potential new pet with the shop owner. He informed me that some people try to breed dogs with specific desired traits in mind. In this case it could have led to inbreeding and there was a chance that the dogs would have temperament issues as well. I felt bad for the dogs but I didn't feel comfortable a large dog that could have temperament problems.