this post was submitted on 30 Mar 2024
1200 points (100.0% liked)

Comic Strips

16634 readers
1618 users here now

Comic Strips is a community for those who love comic stories.

The rules are simple:

Web of links

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (2 children)

This is all nice and cute but how will fox domestication be represented in the future by these types of comic strips?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

Fox's aren't going to be domesticated.

Foxes dont follow a hierarchical system like dogs, cats or horses where there is an Alpha (the owner of the animal) whom they fall under in the pecking order.

Foxes like to shit and piss all over everything and burrow Into couches. Good luck with the fox thing.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nope, none of that is true. None of those animals have Dominance hierarchies.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

None of them really have a hierarchy at all. Dogs, cats and horses are usually just a breeding pair and their offspring. Actually foxes are the only animal you named that does live in a structured hierarchy.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Aren't most foxes solitary?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I don't know anything about it, but apparently alpha wolves are not actually a thing. Can someone chime in more info?

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The guy that claimed it later proved it wasn't true and has spent the rest of his life yelling about how he was wrong. With way too many people not listening. Wolves just exist in social groups.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

The study was on captive wolves, so it was not accurate to wolves in their natural environment. All it shows is that if you restrict wolves to a very small amount of territory, they will fight for dominance, probably because they think it means food scarcity.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That hierarchy thing was proven to be bullshit ages ago

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Can you send me a link to where you heard that?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Ah, fair enough, thank you.

I personally dont think we're close to fox total domestication however. It seems like we've selective breed a human friendly temperament but there's more to it than that for the sake of pet-ness that I'm sure people like to have. That is the main point in my OP. They love to mark, burrow into furniture and cause other problems. Those issues I think will be harder to alter than temperament. Probably not in my lifetime or most of ours in my opinion.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You might be today's lucky 10,000, but have you heard of the Domesticated Silver Fox?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I've heard but I dont think that's really considered domestication yet, only partly.

We've adjusted their temperament, but there is more to it than that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

They are not going to get domesticated WITH THAT ATTITUDE

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There's the famous Russian breeding experiment where they were able to breed domestic foxes.

The problem is that they pee every time they get excited. Which would be bad enough if it was a dog, but fox pee smells god awful.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I believe that study (I could be mistakenly thinking of another study) also showed that their bone density decreases with domestication.