Dogs

Dogs are omnivores, which means they can eat and digest both plant and animal foods!

A healthy adult dog typically eats about 2-3% of their body weight in food each day!

Dogs can taste five basic things: sweet, sour, salty, bitter, and umami (savory).

Unlike cats, dogs aren’t strictly carnivores and can survive on a properly planned vegetarian diet (though they prefer meat)!

Dogs can understand human pointing gestures from as young as six weeks old!

When a dog leans against you, they’re showing trust and seeking affection!

Dogs can learn the names of over 100 different toys and objects!

Puppies learn important life skills by playing with their littermates, including bite control and social boundaries!

Dogs bow to each other (and to humans) as an invitation to play!

Dogs can tell time by smelling how much of their owner’s scent has disappeared during the day!

When dogs circle before lying down, they’re following an ancient instinct to create a safe, comfortable spot!

Dogs have a special bark just for playing that sounds different from their warning or attention-seeking barks!

When dogs sleep back-to-back with other dogs or humans, it’s a sign of complete trust!

Dogs can understand human emotions by combining their senses of smell and sight!

Dogs can hear sounds four times farther away than humans can!

A dog’s sense of smell is so precise that they can detect one teaspoon of sugar in a million gallons of water!

Dogs can see better in the dark than humans because they have a special layer in their eyes called the tapetum lucidum!

Dogs can smell the passage of time — they know when you’ve been gone for 2 hours versus 4 hours by how much your scent has faded!

Some dogs can run at speeds of up to 45 miles per hour (72 kilometers per hour)!

Dogs can detect human diseases by smelling changes in body chemistry that we can’t notice!

Working dogs can remember and respond to over 100 different commands!

Dogs can feel Earth’s magnetic field and prefer to face north or south when going to the bathroom!

Some dogs can smell things that are up to 40 feet underground!

Dogs can hear the ultrasonic squeaks of small rodents that are completely silent to human ears!

There are approximately 900 million dogs in the world, with about 470 million being pets!

The most common dog breed in the world is the Labrador Retriever!

About 70% of all dogs live in developing countries as free-ranging street dogs!

Several dog breeds are considered endangered, including the Otterhound and the Chinook!

The New Guinea Singing Dog is one of the rarest dog breeds, with only about 200 remaining in captivity!

A dog’s normal heart rate is between 60–140 beats per minute, which is faster than a human’s!

Puppies are born without teeth, but by 8 weeks old they have 28 baby teeth!

A dog’s nose stays wet to help them smell better because scent particles stick better to damp surfaces!

Dogs have three eyelids, and the third one helps keep their eyes clean and protected!

Dogs are super sniffers! They have about 220 million tiny smell detectors in their noses! That’s way more than us humans, who only have about 5 million!

A healthy puppy usually doubles their birth weight in the first week of life!

Dogs don’t see in black and white — they can see colors, but mainly yellows, blues, and grays!

A dog’s brain is about the size of a lemon, but the part that controls smell is 40 times larger than in humans!

The first dog to orbit Earth was named Laika, launched into space by Russia in 1957!

The oldest known dog burial was discovered in Germany and is over 14,000 years old!

Ancient Egyptians worshipped dogs and would shave their entire body when their dog died to show their grief!

Saint Bernards never actually carried brandy barrels around their necks — this was just an artistic creation!

The first seeing-eye dog was trained in Germany during World War I to help veterans who had lost their sight!

Greyhounds were so valued in ancient Egypt that killing one was punishable by death!

The first cloned dog was created in South Korea in 2005 and was named Snuppy!

Dogs have been living with humans for so long that they’ve evolved special eyebrow muscles just to communicate with us better!

The oldest verified dog, Bluey, lived to be 29 years and 5 months old!

The first dog show was held in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England in 1859!

Military working dogs are usually ranked one level higher than their handlers as a sign of respect!

Police dogs can remember and distinguish between over 50 different scents!

Therapy dogs in hospitals can help lower patients’ blood pressure and anxiety levels!