07/06/2024
TIME WELL SPENT: A GLIMPSE INTO ACTIVITY BUDGETS IN DOMESTIC DOGS
A time activity budget is a detailed record quantifying how animals distribute their time across various activities. These budgets are typically represented as proportions or percentages of time spent on activities such as feeding, resting, grooming, or social interactions. Time activity budgets are essential for understanding the natural behaviour patterns (also known as ethograms) of animals.
Out of the 900 million dogs worldwide, only 15-25% are kept as pets, which equates to approximately 135-225 million dogs.
Comparing time budgets of free ranging dogs to pet dogs has its limitations but can provide a valuable blueprint for functionally assessing behaviour issues in pet dogs. It may help in identifying deficits and can also play a role in understanding stereotypical behaviour.
Several studies have been conducted on Free-Ranging Domestic Dogs (FRDD) but creating comparable data sets of time budgets in pet dogs is much more challenging due to individual variability ,regional and cultural differences.
However, a paper by Griss et al, 2021, comparing the movement-specific activity of healthy adult FRDD, farm, and pet dogs across three continents using a Fitbark monitor revealed some interesting findings:
• A bimodal activity pattern was observed in dogs under the least human control, showing two peaks in a 24-hour period, similar to findings in other canids such as wolves and foxes. In owned dogs, the activity pattern was more adapted to humans.
• The second important finding was that dogs in all categories (FRDD, farm, and pet) were equally active overall across all sizes of home ranges. The pet category showed little bimodal activity; however, the total activity levels was similar across the groups.
• Pet dogs had high activity and higher rest compared to FRDD but their moderate activity was shown to be lower.
These new findings are relevant because they impact our understanding of locomotory effects such as exercise, movement, as well as confinement ( link to study in the comments)
Other studies, such as by Banerjee and Bhadra 2019, have examined FRDD dogs’ time distribution in areas such as feeding, resting, grooming, and social interaction ( ref pie chart) We might compare some of these data sets to pet dogs, but how can we know pet dogs are fulfilling their role as ‘dogs in their environment’? It is a complicated and nuanced issue.
Agency, or lack of it, is likely the largest difference between the groups. But also highly relevant, that within the time budget of FRDD, they are rarely observed alone; one or more members of their social group are always present ( which may include humans) Compared to dogs under full human control, FRDD have a higher prevalence of agency. Both these factors fundamentally affect behaviour diversity in all groups, as behaviour diversity has been shown to be a robust measure of positive animal welfare. That said, lives of FRDD aren't all rosy despite higher levels of behaviour diversity and agency, as the mortality rates are high from disease, accidents or culling.
Interestingly, in FRDD, as seen in the chart, vocalisation behaviours make up a significant part of their repertoire. While this might be considered a nuisance in some areas, these vocalisations are largely accepted and even warranted as many of these dogs serve multiple functions in their ecology, such as guarding and alerting. In stark contrast, pet dog owners spend considerable time and resources trying to prevent or stop this behaviour. Descriptive phrases such as ‘demand barking,’ ‘boredom barking,’ or ‘anxious barking’ are commonly used. But, it goes without saying that convincing pet dog owners to accept an hour of vocalisation per day as normal, is unlikely!
One other point of interest is the high proportion of moderate movement activity, which Griss et al have identified in their study also . Again any comparison to pet dogs should factor in variables such as breed , location, age, health, but it's so starkly different to FRDD who are not only moving and exploring but are doing so with a high degree of agency. It's almost impossible for a pet dog to achieve in the average home.
It is clear that the FRDD time budgets are quite different to pet dogs and likely to remain so. Though by being guided by them, we might narrow the gaps between these groups while maintaining high levels of welfare.
One way to delve into this would be to create an activity budget for our own dogs or clients’ dogs, by using the pie chart example in the image. This can easily be done using Word or Excel. You would need data on all the categories beforehand, though if kept a simple exercise, it need not be extensively collected.
If anyone would like a document with more detailed information on time budgets and how to create a chart, please drop us a message with your email.
Boo Blackhurst, CDBC
References:
Griss et al 2021,If they could choose: How would dogs spend their days? Activity patterns in four populations of domestic dogs, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, Volume 243
Banerjee & Bhadra, 2019 Time-activity budget of urban-adapted free-ranging dogs
Miller et al, 2020 Behavioral Diversity as a Potential Indicator of Positive Animal Welfare
Majumder et al, 2014, A dog’s day with humans – time activity
budget of free-ranging dogs in India. Current Science 106, 874–878
