Posted on 09/06/2017 9:31:40 AM PDT by Silentgypsy
Do pack animals just follow their leader? Or if not, how do they reach a consensus? According to observations taken of African wild dogs in Botswana, one option is sneezing.
According to new research, if enough animals in the pack sternutate, that constitutes a quorum that it's time to get up and go hunting.
The research was initiated by Neil Jordan of the UNSW Centre for Ecosystem Science, who was studying the dogs' social rallies. This is when the dogs, when they have finished resting, conduct energetic greeting ceremonies before running off to hunt.
Jordan started to notice that, prior to these rallies, the dogs would sneeze a lot more than usual.
"I wanted to better understand this collective behaviour, and noticed the dogs were sneezing while preparing to go," he said.
"We recorded details of 68 social rallies from 5 African wild dog packs living in the Okavango Delta in Botswana, and couldn't quite believe it when our analyses confirmed our suspicions."
(Excerpt) Read more at sciencealert.com ...
Bingo! was his name oh.
LoL...
Evening Joe. :)
It’s not that far-fetched. Our dearly-departed Dachshund used to ‘vote’ with his nose when we ate dinner. We’d hold out a bite to him, and he’d sniff it for a second. If it passed muster, it was gone in a flash. If he didn’t like it, he’d snort directly on it and back away, like he was trying to sneeze the smell out of his nostrils and back onto whatever it was that put it there. Another of our Dachshunds - his sister - loved Chinese food, except for the shredded carrots. (She took after me.) Once, she got a stray carrot in her mouth with a bite of lo mein, and she literally went *PTUI!* and spit it out like she was in a pumpkin seed spitting contest. It shot three feet across the floor. I mean, it wasn’t like she just scraped her tongue across her teeth - she used her LIPS. My wife and I laughed so hard, it took us five minutes before we’d settled down enough to finish dinner. We still talk about it to this day.
After they vote???
GF’s dog sneezes when it needs to go outside.
My dogs spit.
Usually, it’s something obscenely expensive like their heartworm pills.
Then I have to go wash them off and try again.
And again.
/ad infinitum
We had a pack of those wild dogs at our zoo., (Pittsburgh)
They stink. Really smell bad.
Sadly, they had to be destroyed.
Cool. Dogs have so many talents.
Dear Mr. moose, I didn’t know that wasn’t clear. The FReepers post humorous comments and educational information as well as interesting stories about their experiences. Whenever an article pops up that looks like it could be fun, I post. Our fun titer needs boosting in these times.
We’d use peanut butter or a hunk of cheese. Dogs are so gluttonous they never chew most of the time, anyway.
Do you know why they had to be destroyed? Maybe they smelled bad because they were sick.
LOL!
*snicker*
I was hoping to see a photo of Little Dog. If you go into HTML Sandbox (it’s in with all the other topics at the top of the forum page), they have some pretty good instructions on how to post photos.
They’re cute! (From a distance.)
They really do some funny stuff. We had one that loved puzzles and one day I came home to find my exercycle pedal unscrewed and on the floor.
Well.....he’s little.
He’s a sneak.
He can go down stairs faster than anyone I’ve ever seen.
He’s a serious little rascal. He hardly ever smiles.
I used to take him with me in the pickup, but he’d always change the radio station without asking and he listens to junk radio, mostly NPR and I can’t stand them.
The most disobedient dog I’ve ever had. You call him and he turns around and runs away. He chews up my socks. I yell at him to leave my sock alone, and he’ll pick it up and trot into another room so I can’t see him.
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