History of The Domestication of Animals

The first friend we as a species made is also called our best friend. Dogs were the first animal that man domesticated or back then they were wolves. Wolves were used as hunting companions and if you look at the way man once lived the wolves lives weren't all that changed. The tribes of men had a hierarchy not very different from wolves with values not that different from wolves. We both had pack leaders we both protected the children in similar manners both were good at figuring out the moods of each other and both were friendly to the rest of the people in the group but suspicious of outsiders.

This would mean that a wolf would not have very much trouble growing up in a human environment. an interesting concept is that at times of famine when a family couldn't bear another child and if no one else would adopt them then they would leave them in the wilderness to be eaten by wolves. In times of hunger wolves would eat the baby but in times of plenty wolves were known to raise the child. Hence it is possible that certain wolves domesticated humans before we domesticated them. This all started 100,000 to 200,000 years ago.

Over time dogs evolve from wolves. It is a long process by far the most important part of the evolution is a psychological one. If you got a puppy from a pet store and a wolf cub from the wild the puppy on average would be easier to train and also usually be more friendly. This is because genetically dogs make better pets because those were the dogs that were allowed to breed. We know that dogs must have been around at least 12,000 years ago from fossils.

Of course other animals have been domesticated through the years. The first animal that we domesticated for the purpose of food is sheep. We have found loads of one year old sheep fossils in the middle east around 9000 BC. After 9000 BC we started finding all sorts of domesticated animals mostly cattle and pigs.

Originally cattle were used merely for food milk and leather. But then we noticed something really handy about them. Oxen are strong! After his realization man began using them to plough fields and turn wheels to help with flour.

Cats are a very interesting animal when domesticated. The reason why they are so different from the other types of domesticated animals is because they don't live in packs in the wild. They are also very resourceful as they have to be to survive in almost any habitat including urban environments. Because of this it has been very difficult to control the breeding of cats as they often go where they will when they will. Despite this they are the only other animal other than dogs that are allowed in the house.

It is around 3000 BC that we acquire a whole bunch of new animals most notable amongst them are horses. It is interesting enough to note that scientists think that horses evolved in America even though when we began colonizing America we found no horses here and instead brought horses. Horses were first tamed in central Asia (around Mongolia) but the practice of taming animals spreads quickly. The other animals domesticated include silk moths asses and camels.