According to a study that took over six years to complete, many of the chemicals used can raise your dog’s chances of getting CML, or canine malignant lymphoma.  The study too place at the Foster Hospital for Small Animals at Tuft’s University Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, and studied all of the main stream, professionally administered chemicals in use today.

The dogs that find themselves at the top of the risk pool for CML are often dogs over 50 pounds, and were living in homes where pesticides and herbicides are used.  The study also took into account for lawn care products with insect growth regulators, which are also known as chemical killing agents.

The other type of cancer that has been linked to these chemicals is bladder cancer.  The dogs were often found to have high levels of the toxins in their urine, which has to pass through the bladder eventually.  Combine the fact that many dogs spend a good deal of time laying on the grass in the family yard all summer, with the fact that many of these toxins can be carried on the wind and into the lives of dogs whose family doesn’t use these chemicals.

The studies conducted here were only one over a six year period, which normally isn’t long enough to get a good grasp of everything that is going on.  However, all of the dogs studied had alarming amounts of toxins and chemicals in their systems.  All of this, just or a weed free lawn during the summer.  It’s something to seriously consider, because if it’s bad for them, it’s probably bad for us too.

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Larry Reeves is a conservation biologist and a grad student at the University of Florida.  He was in the Amazon attempting to get photos of vultures by attaching a trail-cam to a carcass, hoping they would land and feast while the camera did all the work.

Reeves’ camera didn’t have all that long to wait before something walked past and triggered a photo to be taken.  However, what the camera caught wasn’t vultures, but a very rare breed of wild dog.  Just to prove that these sightings are so rare, a researcher at Duke University called Renata Leite Pitman has been trying to study this animal for more than 14 years now, and has only managed to collar five in total.

The animal is a part of the canid family, however they are not closely related to foxes or wolves.  They have evolved in the Amazon for millions of years, and have special adaptations that allow them to thrive in a jungle environment where many of their relatives couldn’t do so.  The species is listed on the IUCN Red List, putting them in the “near threatened” category.

According to a National Geographic report, “Leite Pitman and others suspect the dogs’ numbers are declining as a result of deforestation and prey depletion — as well as the presence of domestic dogs, which can introduce a host of diseases, such as parvovirus.”

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As dog lovers, we all already know how emotionally perceptive our dogs are.  Their happiness is amplified by ours, and they are always ready to lick our tears away.  But now there is science to demonstrate that dogs are the only other animal known to be able to recognize human emotions.

Dogs have been humans’ companions for over 10,000 years, so they’ve had plenty of time to get to know us.  Researchers have shown that dogs are able to distinguish emotions in people by using multiple senses.

Psychologists and animal behavior experts at the universities of Lincoln and Sao Paolo teamed up to see how well dogs could understand emotions and how they are displayed.  Veterinary professor Daniel Mills had 17 dogs sit in front of a screen and see images of another dog.  One image showed the dog looking happy, the other angry.

A tape was also played of a dog barking, and which face the subjects looked at was noted.  During excited barking, the dogs spent more time looking at the happy image.  When they heard growling, the dogs tuned in on the angry face.

By using both vision and hearing, the dogs were able to assess the emotional state of the dog in front of them.  A similar test was performed by showing the dogs photos of a happy/angry person, and the results were the same.

“It has been a long-standing debate whether dogs can recognize human emotions. Many dog owners report anecdotally that their pets seem highly sensitive to the moods of human family members,” Professor Mills said.

“However, there is an important difference between learning to respond appropriately to an angry voice, and recognizing a range of very different cues that go together to indicate emotional arousal in another.

“Our findings are the first to show that dogs truly recognize emotions in humans and other dogs.”

Because none of the dogs were trained to determine the moods of the individuals they were seeing on screen, this study suggests that their ability to combine such cues is inborn.

“Previous studies have indicated that dogs can differentiate between human emotions from cues such as facial expressions, but this is not the same as emotional recognition,” explained psychologist Kun Guo.

“Our study shows that dogs have the ability to integrate two different sources of sensory information into a coherent perception of emotion in both humans and dogs.

“To do so requires a system of internal categorization of emotional states.

“This cognitive ability has until now only been evidenced in primates and the capacity to do this across species only seen in humans.”

Emotional contagion, a basic building block of empathy, is when an individual spontaneously shares an emotion with another. Another recent study just proved that this exists in dogs, causing them – like humans and other primates – to mimic one another’s facial expressions.

“If you live in a group and you share with companions many interests and goals, you must understand his or her emotional state, and the only way to do that is to ‘read’ his or her behavior and facial and body expressions,” said lead author Elisabetta Palagi.

Some oblivious humans could learn a lesson from dogs.

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One of these poor neglected animals is Duke. Duke has been chained for 5 years. When he was rescued, he was only 9 kilos, he was left without food and water. He was such in a deplorable condition that he can barely lift the chain he was tied with. Thankfully, there are still some kindhearted people in the world. Volunteers from the Ilioupolis Animal Welfare Union rescued him. Watch the video below and see his amazing transformation!

Duke has made an amazing transformation from a chained dying dog to a very happy friendly dog! He looks so happy and healthy now! He finally can run and play around! He finally has the love and the life that he deserve!

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