Two of Our Most Loved Pets

British spelling.

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Dogs.

Just over 30% of homes in the United Kingdom have dogs. In American homes, the number is higher at around 40%.

Arguably, around 30,000 years ago, wolf-like animals would have been attracted to the smell emanating from the open fires of nomadic hunter-gatherers.

Over time, some animals became more tame than others and started trusting humans.

Roughly 16,000 years ago, some wolf-like animals became domesticated.

An estimated 12,000 years ago, human lifestyles changed as groups formed permanent settlements and cultivated crops.

That may have been when humans started selectively breeding their dogs to be faster, stronger, and larger, like evolution on overdrive.

Today, the FCI officially recognises 360 breeds of dogs from all over the world.

Dogs show so much love, respect, and friendship. We wish their lifespans were longer, as they are greatly missed when they are gone.

A dog's vision is different from ours.

My dog Kobi will not see red tomatoes the way we see them; a red tomato would appear brownish-grey to a dog.

Cones are photoreceptor cells in the retina of an eye.

Unlike humans with three cones, dogs, cats, and most mammals have only two cones, the missing one being red.

Cones are used to see colour. Humans have three types of cones: blue, green, and red, and one of our eyes contains roughly 6 million cones.

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Cats

The history of our pet cats.

About 28% of households in the United Kingdom have cats; the number is slightly higher in the United States.

DNA analysis reveals that all domestic cats that exist today descend from the African wildcat (Felis silvestris lybica).

It is thought that cats were domesticated at least 10,000 years ago.

Early farms were probably overrun with rodents feeding on cereal grain.

Wild cats had been attracted by the large number of rodents, which helped reduce the number of vermin.

Over time, farmers and cats grew closer, leading to the domestication of the wildcat.

The Fertile Crescent is believed to be the very first region where farmers settled and started growing plants as crops.

The Fertile Crescent is the crescent-shaped region in Western Asia and North Africa that spans the modern-day countries of Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, and arguably Egypt.

The comparison between a cat and a human lifespan.

On average, cats live between 13 and 17 years, but a small minority can live much longer.

Cats mature very quickly; the first year of their lives is equivalent to that of a human aged 15 years.

A cat at the age of two is deemed to be equivalent to 24 human years. As cats age beyond three years, the gap lessens to approximately one cat year for every four human years.

The oldest cat ever recorded was a tabby named Creme Puff, who lived in Austin, Texas, United States. It reached an amazing age of 38 years. Creme Puff still holds the Guinness World Record for the longest-living cat.

You have probably noticed that cats spend a lot of their time asleep; it has been estimated that on average they sleep for 13–16 hours per day.

Domestic cats are also fast runners; for short periods, they can reach speeds of up to 30 mph, or 48 kph. The fastest running speed of any man or woman is just over 27 mph or 43 kph.

The domestic cat is a predatory species, which hunts and kills small mammals like mice, rats, and occasionally birds. In the past, pest control was the main reason for keeping them, but that has changed; now they are mostly kept as companions.

It is not surprising that domestic cats are predatory animals when you realise they share over 95% of their DNA with tigers

The end.

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