It’s time to make some flashcards and scrounge up a few No. 2 pencils for a quick pet lover's pop quiz. Whether you loved science, math, history or literature in school, you’ll find something of interest in this list of quirky facts:
Similar to a person’s fingerprint, a dog’s nose print is unique and is sometimes used as identification.
Dogs are known for their legendary sense of smell, and with good anatomical reason. Their noses have as many as 300 million receptors, while humans have about 5 million.
Evidence from a Bloodhound’s remarkable sense of smell is admissible as evidence in a court of law.
When it comes to taste buds, people are the top dogs. Humans have approximately six times more taste buds than dogs, around 9,000 vs 1,700. While some dogs are picky eaters, their overall tendency to eat even questionable fare comes from ancestral instincts when the species survived as scavengers in the wild.
Research indicates that dogs are color-blind but see more colors than just black and white. Dogs can see blue and yellow pretty clearly, but have trouble distinguishing between red and green, similar to humans who are color-blind.
More than half of U.S. presidents have had at least one dog during their time at the White House. And then there’s Calvin Coolidge, who had at least 12!
Rin Tin Tin, the famous German Shepherd, was rescued from a bombed-out dog kennel in France during World War I. After the war he was brought back to the U.S., where he (and his offspring) starred in 27 movies, and he was nominated for an Academy Award.
The only dog breed ever named after a fictional person is the Dandie Dinmont Terrier. The breed’s namesake is a character in the novel Guy Mannering, by Sir Walter Scott.
The Australian Shepherd is an American breed, not Australian. And the Labrador Retriever is originally from Newfoundland, an island near the Labrador Territory in Canada.
A Greyhound can beat a cheetah in a race, depending on how long the race is. The cheetah can run up to 70 mph for about thirty seconds, but a Greyhound can run 35 mph for up to seven miles. So the cheetah would win a short sprint, but the Greyhound would prevail in a longer race.
You don’t need the scientific method to prove there’s something special about our wonderful canine companions. And the fact of the matter is that as long as we’re willing to learn, dogs will always have something to teach us about ourselves and the world around us.
It may be Back to School for the kids – but you can help your dog get back into a routine too at Wet Noses & Wagging Tails Daycare! Ensure your dog is getting the activity and socialization they need.
