Q: My question is one of tails. We have three dogs _ a Boston terrier, a mini poodle and a golden retriever. The Boston has a teeny-weeny tail, the poodle has a tail that was obviously cut off and the golden has a big, long tail. All three seem happy with the way things are, but we were wondering why there seems to be such differences in the tails.
A: The dog is probably the most domesticated animal on earth, one whose genes are controlled by man.
When a dog was born with a little, short tail long ago, humans thought that it was a desirable trait for whatever reason and did their best to be sure that dog had puppies that also had the little bob tails.
The short tail of your poodle is not so simple. Dogs like poodles, terriers, cocker spaniels, boxers, Dobermans and many others are subjected to having their tails "docked" soon after they are born to a length that has been determined by the breed club that controls the standard. The reasons given for this are usually that the job the dog was bred to do is enhanced by the dog having a shorter tail than nature intended.
I do not judge the docking situation as long as it is done by a vet, especially as the dogs really do not seem to care in the end, but there are those who vociferously do, and as a result dogs in the European Union are not docked no matter what the breed.
Obviously the creators of the golden retriever determined that their particular breed was just fine with the tail the way it was.
There are many other different types of tails that breeds of dogs have, such as the tightly curled tail of the pug or the long whip tail of the Greyhound, but no tail type determines if any one dog will be a better pet than the other, and when you compare all these different tail variations with the natural tail of the dog's ancestor _ the wolf _ then you can really appreciate how the creation of the dog by early humans is indeed the eighth Wonder of the World.
Q: I have set up a bird feeder in my backyard for the past 10 years, and now something has happened that I never saw before. Every afternoon a little hawk zooms up to the feeder and snatches one of the birds feeding on the seed on the ground under it. The hawk then flies up into a tree and pulls out the poor little bird's feathers and proceeds to eat it in full view. The birds all scatter when this happens, but a half-hour later they are all back at the feeder. I am really conflicted by this situation. I know the hawk has to eat, but am I doing a disservice to the little birds by encouraging them to congregate in my yard around the feeder as easy targets?
A: The hawk that you have been seeing is most likely a sharp-shinned hawk or a Cooper's hawk, and they evolved to catch and eat little birds and have been doing so since the beginning of time. That hawk that you have been watching will catch and eat a little bird every day whether or not you feed the other birds in your yard. What to do is up to you. There are those who would welcome to see a bit of the natural world played out like this in their backyard every day, and there are those who feel uncomfortable seeing it.
If it bothers you, then I would suggest that you take down the feeder for a week or 10 days. The little birds that frequent it will disperse to other feeders in the neighborhood and the hawk will move on. Then you can put the feeder back up and the little birds will go back to it as if nothing happened.
Q: How many toys should a parrot have? My wife has a sun conure and the cage has so many toys in it that when they swing around I am afraid the bird will get hit in the head. She says that the bird needs "environmental enrichment" since it is alone all day, but it seems to me that there must be some kind of rule of thumb or guide on this issue.
A: Many people buy toys for their pets as an expression of their love, and no rule of thumb that I express here will ever change that. In a perfect world the best way to ensure environment enrichment for a bird would be to have an assortment of toys on hand and, every morning, put a different one or two in the bird's cage and take them out at night. Then, before you go to work, you put two toys in the cage that are different from those the day before and thus the bird has something different and unexpected to look forward to each day. This is the best way to keep your bird stimulated and entertained if it is alone all day.
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