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Goats display audience-dependent human-directed gazing behaviour in a problem-solving task
Goats might not seem like the most cuddly animals, but researchers have found evidence that goats are as clever as dogs, and just as capable of building emotional relationships with humans as all the other domesticated animals we've let into our hearts and homes. The 2016 study showed that goats stare intensely at their owner when they're struggling to complete a task - a trait that's also observed in domesticated dogs, but not wolves.
[...] "From our earlier research, we already know that goats are smarter than their reputation suggests," said one of the researchers Alan McElligott. "But these results show how they can communicate and interact with their human handlers even though they were not domesticated as pets or working animals."
Not only does that suggest goats have the potential to be awesome and loving sidekicks, just like dogs, it also indicates that living alongside humans for tens of thousands of years - regardless of whether they're companion animals or not - might have a bigger impact on species than we expected.
Goats display audience-dependent human-directed gazing behaviour in a problem-solving task (open, DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2016.0283) (DX)
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 03 2018, @01:24AM (1 child)
It amazes me how often I have heard about some city|institution|whatever which has a hillside that is too steep|irregular|whatever to mow|clear|whatever.
Modern humans are so removed from nature that the vast majority would never think of what should be obvious.
...then there's the smart guys who have turned that into a business. [google.com]
The damned things will eat just about anything.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Tuesday July 03 2018, @05:49PM
The only odd part of that is that you are amazed.
Goats have a long, long, long history of being used to clear underbrush, sometimes with unfortunate results. If you read the Bible you might have noted references to "the cedars of Lebanon". They were eaten by goats. More precisely, goats were used to keep underbrush in check, and they ate all the seedlings and young trees (though I'm not sure what young means in this context).
It's a great way to minimize fire danger. It's also a way to ensure that you don't continue to have a forest. It isn't only small islands that they denude.
As to "They'll eat nearly anything." They ate the plastic covering off my mothers car. When she was doing some construction they ate some of the fiberglass insulation she was getting ready to install. Etc. They don't literally eat tin cans, but I wouldn't be surprised to find them chewing them. (OTOH, they don't seem to eat large pieces of dry wood. Like fence posts.)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.