All animal lovers note the cleanliness of cats. First, a mother cat licks them, then they quickly learn to wash themselves. Dogs also sometimes brush their tongues, remove dirt from the wool with their teeth, but they don’t do it as often as they do, do not treat personal hygiene issues as carefully as cats do.
Why do these animals have such a different approach to hygiene? There is a natural answer to this question.
Hygiene and hunting of cats and dogs
In order to understand the details of this issue, it is necessary to pay attention to the lifestyle of both creatures. Cats and dogs are predators, but their hunting strategies are different. Dogs belong to dogs, they are relatives of wolves. Like wolves, they prefer to stay in packs, and they also hunt in packs, driving their prey. They do not need to hide, hide their smell, because they do not lie in ambush, pursuing prey openly.
Cats hunt alone. An exception in this regard are only the lions who live and hunt prides. A cat is a lone hunter who watches over his prey in an ambush, and therefore is forced to act covertly. She needs to hide her own smell so that the prey does not feel her presence until the very last moment.
Interesting fact: lions are an exception in the cat family, they differ from other large and small cats in a number of ways.They do not know how to retract claws, live in families, actively pursue prey. They also do not wash themselves as often and not as thoroughly as domestic cats.
Communication and smell communication
The cat does not need to maintain close contact with other representatives of its species. And when necessary, they successfully cope with all the tasks of communication through voice and gestures, because they do not need to transmit too much information to each other. As for dogs - everything is more complicated here. Flocking life requires close communication with brothers, the transfer of mass information about yourself, the ability to receive maximum information about the moods, condition of the surrounding individuals. This need becomes most significant during the hunt, when you need to coordinate the actions of a whole group. The smells of dogs play a significant role in communication, they complement the information that can be obtained in other ways - through vision, hearing.
The smell of the dog distinguishes the emotions of the surrounding members of the pack - fear, aggression. Each dog has its own individual "perfume", the pack knows about the location of each individual by smell. They do not need to overfill, look for each other, which simplifies joint actions with pack hunting. A dog needs a smell, because it does not get rid of it by constantly licking its coat. She only cleans herself as necessary. They simply do not have a mortgaged instinctive action associated with the constant maintenance of cleanliness.
However, dogs are perfectly able to mask odors in order to confuse possible prey.Not only hunting, but also domestic dogs willingly wallow in sewage, in grass or earth to hide their smell and acquire the aroma that prevails in the vicinity. Many other animals do the same thing, not just predators. Many rodents also ride on the ground in order to mask their own smell. This is also an instinctive action, laid down from birth.
Animal cleanliness and health
Each animal has innate skills to keep its body clean. Many birds take dust baths to get rid of insects; in winter, most warm-blooded creatures wallow in the snow to brush their wool or feathers. Each animal seeks to keep its coat clean, as its survival depends on it. Dirty wool not only unmasks by smell, but also poorly protects from cold or heat. If the animal ceases to carry out instinctively laid down actions to maintain itself in order, this is evidence of serious distress. Most likely, this creature is sick. And vice versa, well-groomed, shiny hair symbolizes the well-being, health of the animal. This applies to cats, dogs, and all other living things.
Thus, the cat constantly licks itself in order to mask its smell, which serves as a serious obstacle when hunting from an ambush. Dogs do not hunt from ambush, they do not need to hide their smell so seriously. Dogs also need a personal smell, it provides additional communication opportunities inside the pack, while cats interact with their own kind not so tightly, they do not need a smell for this. Self-care is an instinctively pledged action, the animal does not need to learn how to do it.Every kitten knows that he needs to wash himself. A puppy is more likely to wallow in grass or snow, masking its smell.