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Vicki Williams


It can be surprising to find out how little we know about our beloved pets. To broaden this knowledge, veterinarian David Gething, of Creature Comforts, shares some of his favourite facts about dogs.
The figures 
Dogs were domesticated about 15,000 years ago, and their role was to help hunters track food and protect settlements in exchange for scraps of food and some shelter. Dogs have since evolved and have been bred into all shapes and sizes, and all manner of roles and jobs.
The No 1 breed of choice is the Labrador, and the most common dog name is Max.
The biggest dog on record was Zeus, a great Dane who, when standing on his hind legs, was 2.2-metres tall and weighed more than 70kg. The smallest dog on record was Boo Boo, a chihuahua, who was 10cm tall and weighed less than a kilogram.
The toughest dog is probably Cairo, who serves in active duty with Seal Team Six in the US Navy and is known for his love of helicopter rides, high-altitude parachute jumps and playing fetch the bad guys.
Gething, however, thinks Cairo has some tough competition historically from Sergeant Stubby, who served in four offensives in the first world war, saved numerous lives by detecting and warning of incoming gas and artillery shells, and apparently apprehended a German spy all on his own and held him by the seat of his pants until reinforcements arrived - or so the story goes. Stubby returned home a war hero, participated in numerous parades, met three American presidents and was awarded two medals.
Their senses 
Dogs can definitely hear and smell much better than humans. Dogs can hear sounds roughly four times further away than humans, and can detect much higher-pitched sounds. In addition, dogs can swivel their ears to better detect sounds from one angle while blocking out noise from other angles.
Where they really excel, though, is in smell. A dog's nose is about a million times more sensitive than that of a human. And they can detect which way the wind is blowing and where scents are coming from.
Seeing in colour 
Dogs can see colour but they aren't as good at seeing it as us humans are. Dogs have evolved to have far more rods (black and white vision) and less cones (colour) than humans, and they are red-green colour-blind. The reason for this, Gething says, is that the rods give them much better night vision and make them extremely good at picking up movement, which makes dogs excellent hunters, especially when it is dark.
Can dogs distinguish pictures on television? 
As dogs have a high number of rods in their eyes, they are far better at seeing movement and change than humans and, with most older televisions, which only refresh or update the image on screen about 50 times per second, the picture will appear blurry to a dog. However, Gething says: "The modern, top-of-the-line, flat-screen televisions refresh over 100 times a second, which is perfectly adequate for a dog to watch."
How clever is my dog? 
Dogs excel at social and emotional intelligence and, in some respects, are far more perceptive than many humans, Gething says. But even the smartest dogs can't do maths. This is because dogs have evolved to enhance different aspects of their intelligence.
Dogs live in a pack hierarchy structure, with an alpha dog at the top and a number of beta animals below. They have developed complicated verbal-, visual- and olfactory-based cues to communicate signals and co-ordinate their actions during hunts. This means that in a domestic situation, dogs are canny about social order. Gething says a pet dog will have a detailed mental breakdown of the entire family order, from who they view as the head of the house down to who they see at the bottom. "They will also have a place for themselves on this family hierarchy, and their opinion on their position may surprise their owner."
Smart breeds 
Some breeds are more intelligent than others, partly due to selective breeding and partly due to chance. There have been a number of dog intelligence tests developed that involve memory, command learning and reasoning, the vet says. The most intelligent are border collies, German shepherds, standard poodles and retrievers. The lowest scoring is the Afghan hound. "As the owner of a loyal and lovely but not particularly bright dog," Gething says, "I can attest that he seems pretty happy and has his life rather well sorted out to his liking. So maybe the IQ tests aren't the final word." Felix Paige 
 
For editorial inquiries: specialistpublications@scmp.com
 


Fun facts every dog owner needs to know

The Afghan hound fares poorly in dog intelligence tests. Photo: Thinkstock

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It can be surprising to find out how little we know about our beloved pets. To broaden this knowledge, veterinarian David Gething, of Creature Comforts, shares some of his favourite facts about dogs.
