Before I proceed, I am about to comment on a nature conservation issue which is very delicate and should be regarded with great care.
I am not endorsing neglectful and potentially harmful dog-wildlife interactions that are detrimental for either dogs or wildlife, or both.
However, with sufficient care and in some situations (that are not repetitive leading to habituation), I believe that separate occasions of dog-wildlife interactions can be beneficial if they are willingly reciprocated by the wild species individual and do not harm the habitat.
My interspecies positive interaction theory partly originated from the studies of bear cognition.
The assumption has been that the bear advanced cognition and large brain has developed to a lesser extent due to complex social systems (as in several other species, e.g., primates or canids) but rather due to the bear’s omnivorous generalist diet where the bear has to engage in extremely varied and diversified foraging strategies in order to sustain its large body through all seasons in different regions etc.
Namely, bears gather berries, they scavenge, they kill prey, they dig up roots, they consume grasses and forbs, they eat different types of nuts that have to be shelled or obtained from cones, they catch fish etc.
Recently I exchanged a few messages with Ms. Jennifer Vonk who studies animal behaviour and cognition (e.g. Vonk, J. & Jett., S.E., 2018).
Ms. Vonk has published several papers on bear cognition (problem solving) and I was wondering what she thought about the aspect of bear foraging that involves also very complex and diverse interactions with other species.
Bear belongs to a great number of foraging guilds and during the bear’s exploits, the bear likely interacts with perhaps more individuals of other species than most organisms (partly because bears are large and probably do not exceedingly attempt to avoid these interactions the way smaller animals do by adjusting their space-time use patterns or adapting their foraging niche).
I was wondering whether these interspecific interactions could have contributed to the bear’s brain development (just like the complex foraging behaviour likely has).
Ms. Vonk stated that she agreed it probably would… bear consequence and that she had, in fact, touched upon it in one of her publications (which I had not read, unfortunately, prior to that and I forgot to ask which one it was but I will reference it here if I come across it accidentally).
Interspecific interactions can possibly lead to superior cognition in animals which can result in enhanced problem solving, tool use and, potentially, enhanced survival (due to resourcefulness, quick thinking, adaptability etc.).
What I am about to write next is my own theory and I have not discussed it with Ms. Vonk which is why she should not be implicated in my reasoning.
Most interactions that bears face are likely not threatening to the bears (apart from interactions with other large predators) but they are probably agonistic in nature.
It means that they are not positive in terms of psychological experience and physiological stress effects but if they are not overly harmful, they might bring about some benefit that later results in greater problem-solving skills etc.
If such interspecific interactions could improve the cognition of the species involved, positive experiences (e.g., play situations, exploration, curiosity) with friendly-inclined and not resource-anxious dogs or cats might lead to advancements in wild species cognition and evolutionary development.
(Although repeated interactions might also lead to habituation which can result in human-wildlife conflicts.)
Another insight from bear studies could be applied to this theme.
Study by Fagen, R. & Fagen, J, 2004 demonstrated that bear cubs who played more during their first year of life (although the determinant of what ‘more’ meant was rather vaguely and subjectively stated), were also likelier to survive past yearling’s age.
The authors had accounted for cubs’ body condition, mother’s traits and food availability which also affect survival rate.
Still, it was found that the cubs’ survival rates were positively affected by play behaviour (among siblings).
The authors could not fully explain it – more research is needed to elucidate the mechanisms behind this play-survival interaction.
A hypothesis was proposed that play helped overcome stress.
One became more tolerant toward stressful situations (and play is not stress-free even when the engagement involves a familiar animal) – and this improved tolerance could provide fitness benefits.
Interestingly, I noticed that when there was a cat and a dog living in our household, the cat got into fewer conflicts with neighbouring cats during periods when the dog sought to play with the cat (interaction).
The dog was not aggressive, nor persistent but the cat was unwilling to play.
After a brief attempt to entice the cat to play, the dog withdrew.
This caused not verily stress but rather mild irritation for the cat who often changed places after the interaction.
However, I observed that when the dog had tried to play with the cat, fewer conflicts followed outside between the cat and other neighbouring territorial cats (while such conflicts were rather common during other periods).
This was rather curious and it made me consider some underlying physiological or psychological mechanisms, e.g., increased stress tolerance in the cat as suggested by the bear study authors or perhaps venting of accumulated psychological load in the cat that would otherwise pour out during encounters with other cats.
However, the effect was not permanent and the conflict rates resumed after a while.
This could be, on some level, related to the ‘rough treatment’ of subordinates by more dominating individuals in social animals.
Perhaps the reason behind these interactions are not related to social stress within the group but rather to the efforts by the group members to build tolerance or to reduce some (hormonal?) physiological / physiological load in the subordinate individual that might otherwise affect the individual’s performance in ‘real life situations’ (defense, foraging etc.).
Many dogs (and perhaps cats although I am simply less familiar with cats) are inclined to play with other species and other species at times respond, as well, with curiosity or even eagerness to interact briefly and with caution.
Perhaps these avenues (improved cognition through positive interspecific interactions and improved survival that results from playful / stress-tolerance-building interactions) could be helpful in advancing a more holistic view of the entire spectre of pet-wildlife interactions, their nature and short-term / long-term effects.
I have seen many videos (which are often uploaded as ‘funny animal videos’ but I regard them also from the perspective of analysis) where wild species (deer, otters, badgers) play with either dogs or sheep, or younger cattle etc.
For example, recently I saw this video which involves an interaction between dogs and an otter.
You can be the judge whether the otter had been coerced into the play situation or it was simply defending something and not playing at all, or whether the otter wanted to play with the dogs willingly and was as curious about the dogs as the dogs were about the otter.
My guess is on the latter and I base my assumption on the otter’s body language and behaviour (sometimes it seemed that the otter initiated play bouts).
You can also attempt to predict whether such encounter would lead to habituation after this single event (and what would happen if the dogs met the otter on their walks, e.g., every week) and whether the experience would result in the otter approaching other dogs, as well.
One method to advance a species’ evolution is genetics. But another method is exposure to novel situations and engaging genes that might be dormant because they have not been used routinely.
This could lead to certain new behaviours that can be passed on to new generations or even result in bodily traits.
I am aware that most people would oppose by arguing against habituation.
If wild animals learn to play with dogs, it can only lead to conflict with humans and it can lead to these wild individuals approaching potentially harmful dogs.
I am not sure how founded these claims are.
For example, most conservationists would say – when a wild animal learns that there are ‘good humans’ or ‘good dogs’, they will automatically assume that all dogs and all humans are safe and they will approach unsafe dogs/humans thus getting into trouble.
I think that wild animals have to be capable of discerning among different individuals and their disposition (which can, moreover, be temporarily dynamic).
I do not believe that they readily assume that all individuals of the same species are identical in their attitude or that all individuals are always disposed to the same attitudes.
Perhaps positive experience with dogs or humans might lead to a different initial disposition (curiosity instead of fear, greater confidence instead of panic) but I find it very hard to believe that the middle stage of assessing the specific situation would be entirely skipped.
From what I have seen, animals would always use caution and even if they started out with curiosity rather than fright, they would not just approach anyone right away to play with them or to be petted etc.
This is proven, for example, by many captive wild wolves in research centres who are friendly with familiar humans but not with strangers (unless explicitly encouraged by the familiar human) (e.g., Hansen Wheat, C. et al., 2022).
People call upon cases (e.g., wolf Romeo from Juneau, Alaska) where wildlife interactions with humans or dogs end badly (wolf’s curiousity to approach human settlements exposed him to becoming poached although this would be equal to placing blame on an individual or his/her friends if the individual got murdered on the way to the friend’s house) and where wild individuals exhibit extreme habituation but nobody has actually researched how typical these situations are and whether this behaviour is normal or very unusual.
We should not extrapolate from a few cases where the circumstance might have affected the individual’s decisions (e.g, Romeo was a lone wolf and lone wolves are generally likelier to approach human settlements) and which might not be representative of the majority of cases.
These cases are unusual and in that alone they appeal to us (and this is how we hear about them while we might have not heard of cases where a wild individual interacted with one dog or two dogs and nothing dramatic happened afterward) but it is possible that they represent only a small percentage of wild individuals and their choices as well as the outcomes of interspecific interactions.
In order to say that all wild animals who have had positive interactions with domesticated species become habituated, we should base our claims on statistics, not merely separate stories that involve elements of hype and are not balanced out by other stories that do not get media attention.
Many animals interact with, for example, livestock.
I have watched young badgers playing with ewes in UK countryside (camera trap video).
But these badger cubs did not end up following the ewe to the shed and they caused no further trouble with the humans (although the interaction between badgers and cattle might have more serious consequence due to disease transmission, bTB).
This is perhaps an avenue to investigate.
Bear cognition example and play-survival interaction could provide some real benefits of how domestic animals who can be friendlier because they do not have to compete for food, nor they have to defend territories, protect cubs etc. might benefit wild species.
Of course, it is a complex issue and caution is needed (e.g., friendly interactions can turn unfriendly during period when the wild individual is raising their young or near the densite etc.).
Later notes –
There might be a limit to how many interactions are needed to yield benefit as opposed to how many interactions are safe to ensure the animals’ safety (if habituation risk was scientifically proven to to emerge from more frequent interactions between two individuals over a longer period of time).
***
The habituation risk might also depend on the age by the wild individual upon encounter.
Young individuals might be more curious but they might also be more predisposed to make more impactful assumptions about the other species that they meet based on their first experience with these species.
That is, if a cub meets a friendly dog and this is its first encounter with a dog, and these encounters are frequent or only friendly dogs are met initially, the cub might form a certain assumption regarding dogs as a friendly species which could lead to undesirable effects if unfriendly dogs were met later at life.
On the other hand, if the cub / subadult is accompanied by more experienced individuals (parents, adults), they might learn the complexity of the situation from the reactions and caution by the adults.
Also, adults might demonstrate wary attitudes toward dogs’ scent (outside of the friendly encounter) which could teach the young individual that there is basis to observe caution.
References
Fagen, Robert & Fagen, Johanna. (2004). Juvenile survival and benefits of play behaviour in brown bears, Ursus arctos. Evolutionary Ecology Research. 6.
Hansen Wheat, C., Larsson, L., Berner, P., & Temrin, H. (2022). Human-directed attachment behavior in wolves suggests standing ancestral variation for human–dog attachment bonds. Ecology and Evolution, 12, e9299. https://doi.org/10.1002/ece3.9299
Vonk, J., & Jett, S.E. (2018). “Bear-ly” learning: Limits of abstraction in black bear cognition. Animal Behavior and Cognition, 5(1), 68-78. https://doi.org/10.26451/abc.05.01.06.2018
Notes by Ieva 