Dogs Poop Along North-South Magnetic Lines

Today's post is brought to you in the interest of science...right after you fill your mug with coffee and snag yourself a virtual chocolate doughnut or two. Great to see you today, BTW. Hope you're not too pooped to continue reading because, although I'll bet you never thought about this, it is kind of interesting.

Dog owners have observed some odd behaviors among their pets — sniffing butts, eating garbage, giving unconditional love — but one habit has probably escaped their attention: Dogs apparently prefer to poop while aligned with the north-south axis of the Earth's magnetic field.(There he goes...ol' Bob's off on the poop trail again!)

That's the surprising conclusion of an exhaustive study, conducted by German and Czech 
researchers, who spent two years watching 70 dogs while they defecated and urinated thousands of times. The scientists then compared the dogs' behavior and orientation with the geomagnetic conditions prevailing at the time.

The researchers found that the dogs preferred to poop when their bodies were aligned in a north-south direction, as determined by the geomagnetic field. (True north, which is determined by the position of the poles, is slightly different from magnetic north.)

So that's why they turn and turn and turn until they find what we all thought was the right spot. Turns out that they are aligning their butts with the north-south axis. Hey...me too. I like my butt aligned with the toilet which, as it turns out, is also aligned with the same axis. Isn't science amazing?

See ya, eh!

Bob