Meet Dogor, an 18,000-year-old canine discovered in Siberian permafrost whose name means “buddy” in Yakut. The prehistoric pup’s remains are perplexing researchers since genetic testing suggests it isn’t a wolf or a dog, implying it could be an elusive progenitor of both.
According to the North-Eastern Federal University in Yakutsk, the creature’s remains were discovered in the summer of 2018 in a frozen lump of ground near the Indigirka River.
Permafrost had preserved the puppy’s entire body, thick hair, nose, and even whiskers and eyelashes allowing researchers at Sweden’s Centre for Palaeogenetics to sequence the animal’s DNA using a fragment of the rib bone.
Dogor was found to be male, but even after two rounds of analysis, the experts couldn’t tell if he was a dog or a wolf.
‘Normally, it’s rather straightforward to determine the difference between the two,’ says the author. David Stanton, a research fellow at the Centre for Palaeogenetics, told CNN’s Amy Woodyatt. ‘We already have a lot of data from it, and with that much data, you’d expect to be able to discern if it was one or the other.’ The fact that we can’t suggest that it’s from a population that descended from both dogs and wolves.’
Scientists may be unable to pinpoint the specific species because the discovery dates back to the time when dogs were domesticated. Dogor, according to Stanton, arose during an important period in canine history, when wolf species were dying out and early dogs were emerging.
‘As you go back in time, as you get closer to the point when dogs and wolves merge, [it gets] more difficult to tell the two apart,’ Stanton observed.
It is unclear when and how puppies separated from wolves. Scientists generally think that modern gray wolves and dogs diverged from a common ancestor 15,000 to 40,000 years ago, as previously explained by Brian Handwerk for Smithsonian.com. However, how dogs became dogs is debatable.
Some research implies that humans domesticated dogs only once, whereas other studies suggest that dogs were domesticated several times. It’s also debatable where in the world wild dogs became man’s best buddy. The human-animal link can be traced back to Mongolia, China, and Europe.
Scientists also disagree on how dogs came to be partnered with humans. Some believe humans captured and actively domesticated wolf pups. Others believe that by hanging out near humans and obtaining access to their leftover food, a strain of “friendly,” less aggressive wolves domesticated themselves.
Dorgor’s DNA may be able to help solve these riddles. The third round of DNA testing is planned, which could help conclusively position Dogor in the canine family tree. Simultaneously, as climate change affects the Siberian permafrost, people will discover more and more old species unthawing.
