Dogs and People Bonded in the Americas Earlier Than Thought

Connections in the Americas between dogs and people began 12,000 years ago, researchers report.

December 20, 2024


“Dog is man’s best friend” may be an ancient cliché, but when that friendship began is a longstanding question among scientists. The new study is one step closer to an answer on how Indigenous people in the Americas interacted with early dogs and wolves.

. . .

Lanoë and his colleagues unearthed a tibia, or lower-leg bone, of an adult canine in 2018 at a longstanding archeological site in Alaska called Swan Point, about 70 miles southeast of Fairbanks. Radiocarbon dating showed that the canine was alive about 12,000 years ago, near the end of the Ice Age.

Another excavation by the researchers in June 2023—of an 8,100-year-old canine jawbone at a nearby site called Hollembaek Hill, south of Delta Junction—also shows signs of possible domestication.

The smoking gun
Chemical analyses of both bones found substantial contributions from salmon proteins, meaning the canine had regularly eaten the fish. This was not typical of canines in the area during that time, as they hunted land animals almost exclusively. The most likely explanation for salmon showing up in the animal’s diet? Dependence on humans.

“This is the smoking gun because they’re not really going after salmon in the wild,” says study coauthor Ben Potter, an archaeologist with the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

More:
https://goodmenproject.com/featured-content/dogs-and-people-bonded-in-the-americas-earlier-than-thought/