Dominance Hierarchies in the Groups of Free-ranging Dogs (Canis familiaris)

Behera, Asit Kumar (2016) Dominance Hierarchies in the Groups of Free-ranging Dogs (Canis familiaris). Masters thesis, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata.

PDF (MS dissertation of Asit Kumar Behera (11MS042)) Asit_11042_MS-Thesis.pdf - Submitted Version Restricted to Repository staff only Download (4MB)

Abstract

The domestic dog (Canis familiaris) is a member of the family Canidae. The domestic dogs which do not have any owners, their movements and activities are not limited by human beings are known as free-ranging dogs. Not much is known about their social behavior, and the possibility that they could form stable social groups is highly debated. Free-ranging dogs in India present an intermediate behavioural ecological condition between the ancestral wolves and the modern day pets. So it is interesting to understand whether they form stable hierarchies in their social groups. In this study, first the existence of feeding hierarchies is investigated. Then they are compared with the social dominance hierarchies in groups of free-ranging dogs. For feeding hierarchy, latency time and feeding proportion of dogs were compared with their groupmates whereas for social dominance hierarchy, the pattern of dyadic exchange of a number of behaviors were quantified. The findings of this study contradict the notion that free-ranging dogs don’t form social hierarchies in their groups. There are distinct feeding hierarchies in free-ranging dog groups. Feeding hierarchies overlap with social dominance hierarchies indicating that the feeding behavior of free-ranging dogs is similar to that found in wolf packs.

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