The Consequences of Selective Breeding

From Wild Wolf to Your Best Friend

While all dogs are descended from wild wolves, dogs of different breeds can look and act very differently from each other.

It may be surprising to remember that the Pomeranian sleeping in your purse has wolf ancestry!

Since humans domesticated our dogs' ancestors over 15,000 years ago, we’ve been breeding them for specific behaviors like guarding, herding, friendliness and aggression, and for appearances, like body size, fur type and coat color.

Over many generations, we’ve bred dozens of unique, loveable and useful types of dogs. But this severe inbreeding also compounded the likelihood that genetic mistakes would be passed on.