What Happened to the Big, Bad Wolf?
As the wolf became increasingly associated with humans, we began to mold the wolf into a creature more habituated to man’s wants and needs, eventually creating a new species. Our different tribes had different needs and thus we selected for some traits in one part of the world and entirely different ones in others. Because our social groups were isolated by distance, language and culture, our dogs became specialists, increasingly different from their ancestor the wolf and increasingly different from one other. Variety Is the Spice of Life Across the various breeds, dogs show extreme variation in physical attributes–from the diminutive Chihuahua to the very large Wolfhound, from the flat-faced Pug to the elongated snout of the German Shepherd Dog. We might conclude that dogs breeds exhibit a variety of unique behaviors as well. However, selection only modified existing behavior, diminishing some traits while exaggerating others. It did not create anything new or take anyting away. All
