Usually dogs are friendly
In our opinion, touching the nose with dogs is a very friendly behavior, and dogs often cooperate quite well. Such a nasal behavior may not be a single action, which may contain other meanings. When a bitch is close to a non -biological puppy, he also lowered his head and touched his nose with the puppy in turn. Sometimes the bitch also touches the puppy's face with his nose and smells other parts of them. These interactions start with the nose.
For animals, touching nose is part of daily greetings. Cat's behavior is more frequent than dogs. They usually rub each other when they touch their noses, and sometimes they smell each other's head or other parts. Cats usually touch all the kind of friendship they encounter.
But the dog is more picky about the object of touching the nose, not every time the dogs greet each other will touch the nose. However, it is common for adult dogs and puppies to touch their noses. It is normal for dogs to greet dogs with other types of friendly animals. Therefore, sometimes dogs will touch animals such as cats and horses. When human babies are still climbing on the ground, the dog will also greet him with his nose.
Touching the nose is a very important part of the puppy social. The owners can actually use this to make the dog more obedient. For example, if an adult dog of a dog is more noisy, the owner can often touch its nose when the dog is still young, which may reduce the possibility of hurting people in the future. In fact, for all types of dogs, humans and their noses with them when they were young can help them grow up better with humans when they grow up.
In addition, some researchers pointed out in the "Animal Behavior" magazine that the greeting function of dogs may have more practical reasons -food. Marian Herlin and Dennis Tona simulated a scene at the Institute of Zoology at the University of Zurich, letting one "observing dog" watch the other "exploring dogs" in the new space.
It may also be a communication behavior
First of all, there are 4 different locations in the room, one of which is hidden in food. The driver dog knows that there are hidden foods in the room, and the researchers will let it see the process of hiding food. Then, the researchers settled the partition at 4 different positions, and then put the dog in the room to let it observe the behavior of the driver's dog was released.
Because of the process of seeking food hiding food before, the driving dog obviously could directly find the partitions with food and get food. However, during the trial, researchers sometimes leave food, and sometimes the food in the partition is quietly moved away. In other words, mobile dogs can sometimes find food to eat, and sometimes they can't find food behind the partition. For the dogs, the dog did not see the food at all during the previous experiment, so I don't know what the driving dog runs between the partitions.
After that, let the observation dogs and mobile dogs communicate, just like the expected situation, the two dogs will start with their noses as greetings and communication. Next is an amazing discovery: If the dog ate food before, observing the dog after touching his nose, it is likely to immediately run behind the partition that the Dog's dog just goes. If the dog does not eat food, observing the dog usually does not run over, or after a long time before running.
Therefore, the researchers concluded that the touches between dogs may not only be a greeting way, but also can exchange information about food. This answer can be found from the opponent's breath, and the location of the food is where the dog has been to.