Sorry, just looking for a place to lie down.
[MUSIC]
Anthony Carboni here for DNews. Dogs seemingly need to spin before just about everything.
Going to the bathroom, lying down, when they're excited- dogs are weird. Why are dogs weird?
In terms of spinning, I mean.
Circling before going to sleep might seem weird on your couch, but in the wild, dogs
would spin and trample to push down tall grasses and underbrush, pack down snow, and drive
away snakes and insects. It kept them clean, warm, and hidden. Flattening the ground in
circles could also have been a sign to other dogs wandering by that the territory had already
been claimed.
Those hygiene and territorial instincts might factor into why they spin before going to
the bathroom, too- patting down underbrush keeps the dog's waste from sticking to it
and then rubbing on their own fur. Also, patting down the area could allow for the scents in
their urine and feces to spread farther, making it clearer what territory they marked.
But there's an even newer, weirder theory about puppy poop spins that I am WAY more
into. We've talked before about magnetoception, a sense that allow some animals to feel earth's
magnetic field. Birds use it in migration, some studies say cows use it to align themselves
in a north-south pattern when they graze and now it seems like dogs use it to poop in exactly
the same direction.
In a study published recently in Frontiers in Zoology, researchers watched 70 dogs across
37 breeds for two years as they pulled off a poop spin combo and they all prefered to
poop aligned north-to-south when the earth's magnetic field is calm. That's about 20 percent
of the time during daylight hours. During things like solar flares or geomagnetic storms
or other events, they were less picky about it.
The researchers aren't sure why they prefer it- but they did note that not only do dogs
prefer north-south, they actively avoid a straight-up east/west orientation.
I wonder if its some remnant of a past, stronger sense they had. We humans have proteins in
our eyes that make researchers think that at some point in the past we could SEE earth's
magnetic field. It seems like a strong magnetic sense would help pack animals move and hunt
in some way. But why the pooping, dogs? Why is the poop direction important?
Do you guys have any theories? Spin around three times and let me know down below. Oh,
and if you're into dogs, our friends at Animalist News are going to the Westminster Dog Show
in NYC. They'll be there on the 10th and 11th, so head over and subscribe now so you don't
miss it.