Will wolves really be domesticated into dogs? Russian scientists spent 60 years doing experiments, and the results were surprising

Dogs, for humans, are the most loyal animal friends and, at the same time, the favorite animal companion of many people. Through fossil examination, scientists have found that dogs were also one of the first animals domesticated by humans. So, who are the ancestors of dogs?

How the ancestors of dogs were domesticated?

Modern scientific research believes that the ancestors of dogs are wolves, of course, when we look at the appearance, we will find that the "two ha" and wolves still look very similar, which also seems to mean that they are really in the ancient times, the same species.

It is believed that the earliest human domestication of wolves can be traced back to 40,000 years ago, and wolves have completely domesticated into dogs about 15,000 years ago.

Nowadays, in terms of classification, both wolves and dogs are canids, in addition, foxes and jackals also belong to the category of canids, and in general, between them, they all seem to be close relatives.

In addition to dogs, other canines in nature are "ruthless", not only with strong survival ability in the wild but also, compared with other animals, canines are generally very smart. "animals, including foxes.

This also makes many people curious, why is the fierce and cunning wolf, can be domesticated? Especially the wolf, which was originally a carnivore, became an omnivore after being domesticated into a dog. After all, dogs eat everything, and many domesticated pet dogs are also very picky eaters and will have a fondness for certain kinds of fruits and so on.

You know this is something that is simply not possible for wolves. Researchers believe that when humans entered the end of the Paleolithic, this time, late Homo sapiens has begun to evolve into modern humans, on earth, basically, in addition to late Homo sapiens, the rest of the human species are also extinct.

So, there is no natural enemy of late homo sapiens, who also began to gradually have a fixed residence, and in this process, the early domestication began, of course, I believe that friends know that today's poultry, livestock, and other such, are evolved from wild animals.

So, how are werewolves domesticated? It is believed that when early humans got enough food and started to have some "food waste", that is, there were some discarded food remains around human living areas, so some wolves started to try to approach and eat the food discarded by humans.

After a long time, when humans discovered this phenomenon, they would try to domesticate the wolf cubs and try to feed them. In this process, some wolves with mild characters established a new relationship with humans, so the early domestication began.

When you see this, you may think that it is too incredible, however, an experiment in the last century provides us with the evidence.

Soviet scientists domesticated fox experiment

In the late 1950s, the former Soviet scientist Dmitri Belyaev, when studying the issue of animal domestication, was also very curious about the issue of how wolves were domesticated into dogs, so he decided to conduct a similar experiment of simulated captivity, and the result was also unexpected.

However, because the fossil examination showed that it took at least tens of thousands of years to domesticate wolves into dogs, Dmitri Belyaev was also prepared before officially starting this experiment, thinking that it might take at least a few hundred years before some clues could be seen.

However, it came as a big surprise to him. Seeing this, some of you may wonder why not just domesticate the wolf. Instead, they choose to domesticate foxes.

This is because foxes, like wolves, are canines, and secondly, compared to the personality aspect, foxes are also more gentle than wolves, which is suitable for such short-term domestication experiments.

Finally, Dmitri Belyaev chose the silver fox, which is very common in Russia, as the subject of his experiment. After searching all the fox farms in Russia, Dmitri Belyaev finally selected 130 foxes as his subject. The 130 foxes were divided into 100 females and 30 males, taking into account the reproduction of the offspring.

Soon the experiment began, of course, at first not directly domesticated them, because these foxes are still very wild, and the foxes are different personalities, want to make the experiment successful, it is necessary to select from the 130 foxes, again, from the selection of more gentle foxes to.

So, in the first few years of the experiment, Dmitri Belyaev led the experimental team members to observe the foxes day and night, and score them, the purpose of doing so, is to select the more docile foxes, we can also see this process, as the foxes "sea selection" process.

In the end, a group of foxes was eliminated, and the relatively docile foxes, are successfully passed into a new round of experiments, of course, this period is not directly domesticated them, but let these docile foxes through mating, to reproduce new offspring, from the genetic point of view, the offspring of these foxes, relatively speaking, is also more mild personality.

When the first generation of baby foxes was successfully bred, the researchers began to take the initiative to get close to them, which was the first step to begin domestication, however, these baby foxes grew up with them and began to gradually alienate humans and did not want to get close to them. Of course, Dmitri Belyaev's team did not give up but continued to domesticate and screen them for breeding, and finally, after three generations, that is, when the fourth generation of foxes appeared, the situation finally changed.

From the fourth generation of foxes, as their genes have been domesticated by humans in their genes, which led to the relationship between them and humans, began to become much closer.

At this time, researchers began to try to give them names, and some of these foxes, after hearing the name, will run towards the direction of calling it, and will also wag their tails, it must be said, this is a great breakthrough.

When the sixth generation of foxes, this situation also became more obvious, these foxes seem to become more like "fox dogs", and even many of them will often feed them and humans to show their feelings of dependence, not only sticky but also like dogs, by licking humans to show their own for human The dog will not only be sticky but also like a dog, by licking the human to show their love and affection.

Of course, in this process, the researchers are also the most gentle group of foxes from which they will choose, and then focus on their domestication, this situation continued until 1986, that is, more than 20 years after this experiment, the lead person of the experiment Dmitri Belyaev because of old age, sickness and died. However, before his death, he had already explained to his team to keep the experiment going.

After all, at the beginning of this experiment, Dmitri Belyaev thought that this experiment might take hundreds of years or even longer complete, and obviously, it was not an experiment he could finish. Fortunately, before Dmitri Belyaev's death, this experiment had already achieved certain results, which means that his conjecture was not wrong.

After 1986, Dmitri Belyaev's experiment began to be handled by other members, and has continued to this day, and now has bred more than 60 generations, and these foxes, too, all look different from the foxes we remember, and when the newborn foxes are bred, at least 70% look more like dogs.

Meanwhile, in some other related experiments, Dmitri Belyaev's team also proved the previous speculation that the reason why fox offspring become closer to humans is also related to genes, which means that during the early domestication of wolves by humans, wolves were also domesticated by humans from generation to generation, and then became closer to humans, which eventually led to their genes to the offspring's In the process of human domestication in the early days, wolves were also domesticated by humans from generation to generation, and then became closer and closer to humans, which eventually led to the transfer of their genes to the offspring, so that the offspring could be better than blue.

This experiment has been conducted for more than 60 years, and although it seems crazy, it has uncovered a mystery in the history of domestication: how did humans domesticate animals? In particular, how do domesticate the ancestors of cats and dogs, so that they become human animal companions?

So, since the domesticated dogs, wolves and foxes belong to the canine family, which of the early mammals belonged to the ancestors of the canines, if we trace them back to their roots?

Who are the ancestors of canines?

There is a very old creature on the earth, and it is the oldest living creature in the whole family, about 8 million years old, which looks like a "fox dog". The raccoon is the main character in "A raccoon on a hill".

Some people think that raccoons may be the ancestor of canines, and even some researchers who oppose the evolution of dogs from wolves also think that dogs may have evolved directly from raccoons, but of course, we cannot know the real situation of tens of thousands of years ago directly, but only through Fossils can only be studied and analyzed.

If one day in the future, humans can find the "half wolf, half dog" species in evolution, perhaps, there is a way to know the exact answer, of course, Dmitri Belyaev's experiment has been proved for us, after all, in the body of the fox, has been proved. What do you think about this? Welcome to the comments section, and share with us!