B.C. by Mastroianni and Hart for September 04, 2011

Appropriate, as it’s Father’s day here in Aus.

And tomorrow’s Labor Day here in the U.S.

My new puppy follows me, well, like a puppy. SHE WHO MUST BE OBEYED is struck with the Green Eyed Monster. I say it is Man’s bonding with wolf back in BC. Should I mention the training treats in my pocket?SHE thinks it’s wonderful how much I walk the chick magnet of the world.

I could give him a haircut.

Good Morning, Fellow Cave Dwellers.

He’s a wolf, not a dog…..

hes the cutest dog wolf in the comic strip universe, tjis is not realityfolks, this is fantasy get a grip

Its nice to be appreciated :-)

At least he was only grumbling and not snarling.

Gang, I humbly recommend Dogs of C-Kennel here on U-Turn Komix. Reasonably new strip, but quite funny.

I think wolfie provides his own doo……☻

The bonding is forever. Sometimes much closer between a man and a dog than a man and a woman. Dogs love you unconditionally, never judge you, are virtually never cranky and certainly never jealous!

Thanks for the comment about it being Father’s Day in Australia. So now I can celebrate two.

I love Wolfie. He’s great. I miss my puppy.

A dog can be a woman’s best friend too!

(And Wolf looks a lot like Kenny from Dogs of C Kennel, in my opinion)

Whether or not dogs and wolves are properly considered the same species (that judgment is being reevaluated, although there’s litte doubt that dogs derive from wolves), 10,000 years of selective breeding have left them with substantial differences. A wolf pup raised among dogs will not behave particularly doggishly, and a dog pup raised among wolves will still be at a huge disadvantage. Before we started breeding for specific skills like tracking and herding, it’s likely that we first simply selected those individuals who were most responsive to humans, least aggressive towards us, submissive, friendly, loyal, “doggish” (even if we didn’t identify these traits as “doggishness” then).

As for Wolfie and his function in THIS strip, he represents “the First Dog”; he can behave like either dog or wolf as the situation warrants, and as today’s installment shows even he’s aware of the disconnect between the two worlds.

domesticated foxes also become more dog-like in a few generations normally

He’s very well behaved…I know plenty of people who’d dance with joy if looking pained was the worse thing their dogs did while groomed.Oh, and the jealousy thing? Dogs do get jealous. Anyone who’s had more than one dog, or cleaned up piddle made while more attention was paid to a guest, knows this.

that’s how it is with my wife

@Lewreaderyes, puppies are chick magnets – chicks age 1 to 101. .I think Wolfie realized he doesn’t have to fight over scraps. He may suffer the grooming, but still get the treats.

Thanks for the leads to the “Dogs of C-Kennel” comic, folks … it’s a good one that I hadn’t known about before.

Wolf Emperor, I’m getting my information from “Inside a Dog”, by Alexandra Horowitz, and while she says that Basenjis are genetically closer to wolves that Huskies (who are, in turn, closer to wolves than German Shepherds), I don’t know whether it’s accurate to say that Basenjis are not true “dogs”. They certainly LOOK less like wolves than either of the two breeds named above. Basenjis have their peculiarities as a breed, but so do many breeds, and I don’t know if, on the whole, their behavior is any more “wolf-like” than some others of more recent refinement. (I’m thinking particularly of their expressive foreheads, and their propensity to clasp their forepaws to grip things.) If there are populations of wild Basenjis out there anywhere, it’s news to me. (They do have a slight resemblance to non-lupine canids like jackals and African wild dogs, but those are definitely different species.)

(n.b. My beloved Bert was half Basenji, so I have a particular interest in the breed.)

If there’s a “missing link” between dogs and wolves out there somewhere, my vote would go for dingos. Evidence suggests that they were more or less domesticated when they were introduced to Australia (somehow) thousands of years ago, but have been feral almost that long, and in isolation (i.e. no native wolf population to reabsorb them) they’ve developed into something that’s a little of both.

Yay! Wolfie’s back!

Best panel in the whole cartoon is the second-to-last one, where Wolfie is having to stop and realize he needs to count his blessings!