At least one study has suggested that dogs could have been domesticated more than once. Researchers analysed mitochondrial DNA sequences from remains of 59 European dogs (aged 3,000 to 14,000 years), and the full genome of a 4,800 year-old dog that was buried beneath the prehistoric mound monument at Newgrange, Ireland.
Comparing these genomes with many wolves and modern dog breeds suggested that dogs were domesticated in Asia, at least 14,000 years ago, and their lineages split some 14,000 to 6,400 years ago into East Asian and Western Eurasian dogs.
But because dog fossils older than these dates have been found in Europe, the authors theorize that wolves may have been domesticated twice, though the European branch didn’t survive to contribute much to today’s dogs.
Intelligent, strong but obedient, these gorgeous wolf-dog breeds will be happy to become part of the family. Find out more about their personalities and what it takes to be their owner.
Wolves are majestic creatures that never cease to fascinate us. Perhaps because we've always had them in our homes, wrapped in the myth and mystery of our bedtime stories, art and film, we want wolf-dog breeds physically in our lives too. After all, they are the wild alter-ego of a pet pooch - powerful and fearless.
The good news is that you don't need to be Little Red Riding Hood to have a wolf in your home, with these gorgeous wolf-dog breeds. There are many dogs that look like wolves, with long pointed muzzles, thick fur and bushy tails. And the good news is that they make great family pets. They're quite energetic and love long walks and playing games with their owners.
When you have cared for dogs and wild wolves from the time they are little more than a week old and have bottle-fed and nurtured them day and night, you are wise to their differences. Since 2008 Zsófia Virányi, an ethologist at the Wolf Science Center in Austria, and her colleagues have been raising the two species to figure out what makes a dog a dog—and a wolf a wolf.
At the center, the researchers oversee and study four packs of wolves and four packs of dogs, containing anywhere from two to six animals each. They have trained the wolves and dogs to follow basic commands, to walk on leashes and to use their nose to tap the screen of a computer monitor so that they can take cognition tests. Yet despite having lived and worked with the scientists for seven years, the wolves retain the independence of mind and behavior that is most undoglike.
“You can leave a piece of meat on a table and tell one of our dogs, 'No!' and he will not take it,” Virányi says. “But the wolves ignore you. They'll look you in the eye and grab the meat”—a disconcerting assertiveness that she has experienced on more than one occasion. And when this happens, she wonders yet again how the wolf ever became the domesticated dog.
“You can't have an animal—a large carnivore—living with you and behaving like that,” she says. “You want an animal that's like a dog; one that accepts 'No!'”
We spend all day carrying the remaining wolves to their pens, and return as evening falls to the project base camp, a small stone cabin at the edge of the woods. The others drink sparkling wine in the kitchenette to celebrate our having released all fourteen gray wolves into their three acclimation pens. But they aren’t free yet, our wolves, the experiment has barely begun. I sit apart at the computer monitors and watch the feed from the cameras in the pens, wondering what they think of this new home. A forest not dissimilar to the one they came from in British Columbia, though temperate instead of boreal. I too came from that forest, and know it will smell different, sound and look and feel different. If there is any one thing I know best about wolves, though, it’s that they adapt. I hold my breath now as big Number Nine approaches delicate Number Six and her daughter. The females have dug a groove into the snow at the very back of the pen and hunker down, wary of Nine’s advance. He towers over them, shades of gray and white and black, as glorious a wolf as I’ve ever seen. He places his head over the back of Six’s neck in a sign of dominance and I feel, with exquisite vividness, his muzzle pressing onto the back of my neck. His soft fur tickles my skin, the heat of his breath brings bumps to my flesh. Number Six whines but stays down, showing her deference. I don’t move; any sign of defiance and those jaws will close over my throat. He nips her on the ear and teeth sink into my lobe, startling my eyes closed. In the dark, the pain fades almost as quickly as it struck. I return to myself. And when I look again Nine has gone back to ignoring the females, pacing round the perimeter of the fence. If I watch, I will feel the cold of the snow on my bare feet with each of his steps but I don’t, I’m already too close, my edges have forgotten themselves. So I look instead at the dark ceiling of the cabin, letting my pulse slow.