Dogs are so interesting, especially how the dog and the extant gray wolf are related.
Yep, they are awesome for helping you as well as like guide dogs
They were even the first species to be domesticated by humans.
Oh wow that makes sense.
I also didn't know before that the actual ancestor of the dog is now extinct.
thats kind of sad but all things go extinct.
Dog
The domestic dog ("Canis lupus familiaris" when considered a subspecies of the wolf or "Canis familiaris" when considered a distinct species) is a member of the genus "Canis" (canines), which forms part of the wolf-like canids, and is the most widely abundant terrestrial carnivore. The dog and the extant gray wolf are sister taxa as modern wolves are not closely related to the wolves that were first domesticated, which implies that the direct ancestor of the dog is extinct. The dog
diverse mitochondrial and nuclear genes. In other words, as closely related domestic dogs are to the grey wolf, they still obtain a large amount of genetic variation. The domestic dog is the only large carnivore to have ever become domesticated. The domestic dog first appeared with humans over 30,000 years ago. It is suggested based on nuclear genetic evidence that dogs originated from wolf populations in Europe and the Middle East, however, mitochondrial evidence suggests that dogs originated from wolf populations located in East Asia. Data also suggests that dogs may