For over 11,000 years, domesticated dogs have been man’s best friend, but are they also man’s bi-est friend?
It’s not exactly breaking news that dogs hump other dogs of the same sex. It’s something everyone in pet-owning societies has seen countless times firsthand. Of course, dogs hump many other things as well — pillows, people’s legs, and even the occasional cat who always seems way too chill about it. In a way, because dogs are so frisky, their behavior tends to get dismissed as just an overabundance of sexual energy rather than as a true example of animal bisexual behavior. But research on dogs tells a different story
Scientists have documented canine same-sex behavior for well over 100 years. Even by the turn of the 20th century, it was considered old news. In an article from the year 1900 published in Magnus Hirschfeld’s German-language sexology journal Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen, zoologist and early sex researcher Ferdinand Karsch-Haack noted “Among the carnivores (Carnivora), in the dog family (Canidae), homosexual acts have often been observed.” By 1999, the landmark book Biological Exuberance, which brought together hundreds of studies and scientific reports on animal same-sex behavior, stated that same-sex mounting as well as “same-sex pair-bonding” had been documented across dog breeds.
And contrary to what you might think, this isn’t just something that happens among male dogs. Numerous studies, such as one observing the behavior of about 300 free-ranging dogs in an Indian city, found that same-sex mounting happened among males and females alike.
More than 1,500 animal species have been observed to engage in bisexual behavior, and dogs appear to be, well, much more energetically bi than most animals. One reason for this is linked to recent evolution. Between 20,000 and 40,000 years ago, humans began living with and selectively breeding canines, and canines also began living around human settlements. It was a process of humans domesticating dogs but also dogs domesticating themselves by adapting to the survival advantages of getting into the good graces of nature’s most deadly apex predator.
As wolves became wild dogs, and wild dogs became wolves, they became friendlier, more playful, more social, and more sociosexual — which is a fancy way of saying more likely to engage in sexual behavior for non-reproductive reasons (just like primates, dolphins, and many of the most intelligent animals). As a 2020 study published in Frontiers of Psychology explained, the domestication and self-domestication process led to “increased expression of adult sexual play and homosexual sexual behavior relative to their wild relatives.” The study authors note that this is a well-documented phenomenon among domesticated animals in general, and since dogs are perhaps the most intimately and extensively domesticated non-human animal, it stands to reason that they should be the most sociosexual, which in practice also means among the most bisexual too.
Many pet owners in the past and even still today are embarrassed or even angry at their dogs for their bi escapades, but as a veterinary scientist wrote in a 2006 study, “the behavior is considered completely normal and should not be punished. […] There is no evidence that male-male or female-female mounting has any negative effects on either animal involved.” The author also makes it a point to clarify that dogs who engage in same-sex behavior are not strictly homosexual, but rather bi, explaining that “mounting dogs of the same gender does not affect future mating behavior with dogs of the opposite sex.” As for why some dogs are on the receiving end of same-sex interactions more often than not, the study offers an insight most people never consider: “Owners of dogs that are more commonly mounted could be using dog grooming products that induce sexual interest in other dogs.” The more you know!
Maybe the most fascinating part of why dogs are so sexually free is the implications it holds for people. After all, what does it tell us about ourselves that as canines evolved to be more relatable and pleasing to humans, they also became more bi?