Each week we bring you the best of dog news all wrapped up in a handy digest. It’s called The Scoop and this week we’ve got funny moments from Crufts, reveal that dogs may be more manipulative than we thought, plus celebrate Sir Patrick for being our dog adoption hero.
Crufts agility dog steals the show
We couldn’t talk about dog news this week without mentioning Crufts. Plenty of pampered pooches strutting their stuff in the show ring, and controversies over dog welfare to boot (did you think the handlers were tugging their dogs’ leads a little too hard?). Perhaps our favourite moment, which was shared like crazy across the interwebs, was the Jack Russell who totally wiped out on the agility course.
In slow motion this looks painful, but you needn’t worry. Olly, who is a rescue dog, was perfectly fine. And in his excitement he continued to lead and jump over the obstacles in the agility course. He didn’t score too highly in the competition, as he failed more than once to successfully follow the correct route, but he did manage to regale the audience with his enthusiastic approach, perhaps you could say he stole the show?
Can you truly trust a dog?
Recently, we’ve been reading a few news stories in science journals about how dog behavioural stories having been attempting to uncover the secrets of dogkind. For example, can dogs recognise a nice human, what genres of music do dogs really dig, do dogs have a sense of humour, and do dogs go grey due to stress? There’s lots we don’t know about what makes man’s best friend tick.
The latest suggestion to make headlines is that dogs are in fact incredibly selfish and manipulative. One headline called dogs “man’s least honest friend” – another said that “dogs use deception to get what they want”.
In a study conducted by a researcher at the University of Zurich in Switzerland, Marianne Heberlein discovered that if a dog’s human had previously withheld treats, they were less likely to lead the human towards the scent of a box containing a delicious sausage – for fear they’d be forced to share it, or worse, they wouldn’t even get a bite!
The study showed that dogs can be incredibly fast learners, even figuring out who is a potential competitor when it comes to their own food supply! You can read more about it here and here.
What do you think? Does your dog ever hilariously beg or change their behaviour when they want food? How do you manage to resist those begging eyes? Tell us in the comments below!
Sir Patrick helps dogs live long and prosper
Undoubtedly the most adorable story to surface this week was the one about Ginger, the rescued American Pit Bull Terrier breeding bitch who’s found love in the arms of none other than Sir Patrick Stewart. Seriously, as if he couldn’t get any more awesome.
Sir Patrick is fostering her while she looks for a foster home and he’s hoping to spread awareness of the “adopt don’t shop” message – which is one we can certainly get on board with!
Whilst they’ll only be together for a relatively short time, the pair already look like they’re having a simply wonderful time. Many Sir Patrick fans have commented urging Ginger to stay with him, they sure do look very happy together! This is a wonderful new chapter for Ginger, whose past life was being used to breed illegal Pit Bull fighting dogs. Pit Bull Terriers are a banned breed in the UK, but only some states in the USA have made them an illegal breed, Sir Patrick is one of the lucky ones as he lives in California where there are only some restrictions on dog ownership based on breed.