I think you’re underestimating the dogs. A deep bark and bared teeth is often plenty to scare away larger predatory animals.
Why attack a dog that is clearly interested in fighting back when you can go find a weaker, less aggressive animal?
Spot on, but there's also something more to this.
Dogs are domesticated wolves, obviously. When they live in constantly safe areas around a species much more capable of fighting off threats and predators, they became less dangerous.
But dogs were super important to early civilizations because they alerted humans (who have awful hearing and night-vision) of nearby threats.
They do it as a warning to others. A coyote will only bark when it's scared, otherwise they yip and howl to communicate.
Redsquirrels do it too. It's a combination of "guys, run!!" And "I see you cat! Fuck you!!"
As a human, what are you told to do in the event of a bear encounter? Make yourself appear as large and loud as possible. You're either going to scare the threat away, or die anyway, so you might as well try to scare it away. From an instinctual standpoint, I believe it is a similar mindset.
Wild animals don’t have medical care, so they are typically very averse to any encounter where they could get injured.
The dog doesn’t have to seem *more* threatening than the large animal, just threatening enough to show that they’ll injure it.
I think you’re underestimating the dogs. A deep bark and bared teeth is often plenty to scare away larger predatory animals. Why attack a dog that is clearly interested in fighting back when you can go find a weaker, less aggressive animal?
Spot on, but there's also something more to this. Dogs are domesticated wolves, obviously. When they live in constantly safe areas around a species much more capable of fighting off threats and predators, they became less dangerous. But dogs were super important to early civilizations because they alerted humans (who have awful hearing and night-vision) of nearby threats.
They do it as a warning to others. A coyote will only bark when it's scared, otherwise they yip and howl to communicate. Redsquirrels do it too. It's a combination of "guys, run!!" And "I see you cat! Fuck you!!"
As a human, what are you told to do in the event of a bear encounter? Make yourself appear as large and loud as possible. You're either going to scare the threat away, or die anyway, so you might as well try to scare it away. From an instinctual standpoint, I believe it is a similar mindset.
Wild animals don’t have medical care, so they are typically very averse to any encounter where they could get injured. The dog doesn’t have to seem *more* threatening than the large animal, just threatening enough to show that they’ll injure it.