Begging Strategy of the Andean DogsAlessandro Finzi, Eleonora Rava

Centro Studi S. Rosa, via O. Benedetti, 21 - 01100 Viterbo, ItalyCorrespondent author: finzi@unitus.it

Prendidos a la magia del polvoriento camino, esperaban los perros hambrientos con sus hocicos

agudos. Néstor Taboada Terán, El precio del estaño.

Abstract

The strategy by which Andean dogs begs for bread is described.Notwithstanding their attitude to form packs, in the height of anAndean road dogs sit lonely in the external part of the road’sbends where the vehicles must slow down and the probabilities ofbeing seen and receiving morsels of bread are the best.Considering correct this choice, the percentages were 81.2%(P<0.001) among dogs and 63.6% (NS) among humans in comparisonwith wrong locations. Another similar case is quoted by literatureconfirming the observed phenomenon.

Introduction

Along the winding Interandina road from Quillacollo to Oruro inBolivia, at the height of 3,000 metres or more, it is easy toobserve dogs sitting at the border still and lonely. Since dogshave the tendency to form packs this behaviour looks unusual, butit can be partially explained when people are seen throwing themchunks of bread from cars or buses running along. The completeexcerpt of the phrase quoted in the epigraph says: “Folded in themagic aura of the dusty road, the hungry dogs were waiting withtheir pointed snout. Travellers threw them chunks of bread. Beyondthe dogs, the indios children of the road, without shoes andskirt.... Swelling up their ponchos they run after the lorries.Mummy, daddy, give us a morsel of bread! Accustomed to thisendless show, travellers threw them some coin, the same as to thehungry dogs”1.1Prendidos a la magia del polvoriento camino, esperaban los perros hambrientos con sus hocicos agudos.Los viajeros les arrojaron pedazos de pan. Después de los perros, muertos de hambre los llocallas de los

It was then planned to study the distribution, location andbehaviour of the animals to understand better their beggingstrategy in its actual manifestation.

Materials and methods

Andean dogs are middle size dog with dense woolly fur ofdifferent colours (fig.1). The unsurfaced road was gone to andfro, in the morning and in the afternoon respectively, startingfrom Quillacollo, in the range from km 70.0 to km 163.3, betweenthe villages of Parotani and Cahiuasi where the dogs were sitting.After the pueblo of Caihuasi, the road becomes asphalted, thevehicles get speediness and no more dogs could be found.

Where the mountain side becomes very steep, the winding roadmakes many hairpin bends that oblige the cars to a quick slowdown. This is the place mainly chosen by dogs to sit at any bendwaiting for food. The position of the dogs in relationship withthe bends, their attitude and the distance from each other wererecorded to evaluate the rightness of their ‘begging strategy’.

Fig. 1 A typical Andean dog.

Dogs’ locations were classified according to a score evaluation of easiness to receive food. Observed typologies were:caminos, sin zapatos ni camisas. .... Inflando sus ponchos perseguían el camión. ¡Madrecitas, padrecitos,regalennos pancito ¡ Habituados a ese sempiterno espectáculo, los viajeros les arrojaron su limosna, igualque a los perros hambrientos. (Néstor Taboada Terán, El precio del estaño, La Paz, Ed.Gisbert y Cia., 1983, p.47).

1. external border of the bend (fig. 2; the dogs are highly visible and the vehicles are slowing down): score 2

2. internal border of the bend (the vehicles are slowing down)a. the bend is covered by the mountain slope (the dogs are

not visible): score 0b. the bend is not covered (fig. 3; the dogs are easily

seen): score 23. straight road (the dogs are visible but the vehicles are

running): score 1

Fig. 2 Dogs waiting at the external bend of the road. In the figure at right abus is coming.

To compare the behaviour of the dogs with the humans’ one, itmust be considered that nearly only children and/or old people areseen on the road2. The main difference in the begging strategy isthat people are nearly always two or more. But, since when theyare two the probability to get a coin is halved, similarly thescoring has been halved or anyway divided by the number ofchildren or people present. Dogs were rarely observed in coupleand in this case the score was also halved.

2 Adult people are normally at work and, if on the road, they crowd round the vehicles at regular stops to sell drinks or local foods.

Fig. 3 The dog is waiting in the internal part of the bend. Nevertheless it iswell visible and the vehicle must slow down.

The occurrences of the correct positioning at the external andinternal part of the bend were compared by a Chi Square Test fordogs and people respectively3. The same was done with reference toscores of dogs and people.

Results and discussion

On a range of 93.3 km, the dogs were observed to sit always atthe border of the road, as shown in fig. 2, 3. They were sittingmainly alone (96.3%) and mainly where the hairpin bends wereformed because of the strong sloping, obliging the vehicles toslow down very much and giving people time to throw the animalsthe chunks of bread they brought with them with this specificpurpose.

The frequency of dogs was one every 2332 metres as a mean. Butfrom km 116.0 to km 139.1, where bends are many, dogs weresitting at each hairpin bend at very short distance form eachother (m 962.5). It was also observed road’s lags of about a kmwere the mean distance was every 240-250 metres. On the contrarypeople were observed mainly in groups and generally not far fromvillages.

On the way back, in the early afternoon, more dogs and peoplewere recorded (table 1). The increase of number was 89.7% and80.9% for dogs and people respectively on a range of the road3 M. Ferrán Aranaz SPSS para Windows. Programación y análisis estadístico. Mcgraw Hill/Interamericana de España, S. A., 1996. ISBN: 84-481-0589-3

also increased to 126.9 km. The mean frequency of dogs was every1775 metres, but again lags of road were observed where dogs weresitting, as before, about every 250 metres.

Dogs couching in the external part of the bends were 81.2%(P<0.01) and people were 63.6% (NS). It is clear that dogs areaware of the correct position to be easily seen when the vehiclesmust slow down. People looks not even equally aware.

When the wrong positions were calculated on the total of blindbends, the percentages were 8.7 % and 40.0% for dogs and humansrespectively (table 2). In the open bends, sitting in the internalpart is still correct. Dogs looks aware of this chance since thenumber of animals that choose this position increases to 24.4%though the number choosing the external part, that is in any casecorrect, remains three times more frequent.

Table 1. Location of dogs and people in the checking of morningand afternoon.

Parameters Subjects Location on Road BendsStraight road

Number Occurr.1

External

Internal Open

Internal Close

Total

Dogs Morn. 39 37 16 6 1 23 14Aftern.

74 72 36 4 1 41 31 2

Total 113 109 52 10 2 64 45

People

Morn. 21 11 3 4 1 8 3Aftern.

38 22 11 2 1 14 8

Total 59 33 14 6 2 22 111 Occurrences are less than the number, because more subjects can be present inthe same observed occurrence.2 In this group two cases are included in which the vehicles were obliged to slowbecause of a steep sloping and a road hump.

Table 2 Data are analyzed to show better the rightness ofubication.

Blind bends* Open bends*

Ubication External Internal(wrong)

External Internal

Dogs 21 2(8.7%)

31 10 (24.4%)

People 3 2(40.0%)

11 6 (35.3%)

* The ubication in the internal part of the blind bends is wrong since thesubjects are seen too late to receive food or charity. Both location are correctin the open bends.

The highly frequent presence of the dogs at the external borderof the bends, or anyway where they are easily seen in advance, isexplained by the fact that dogs seem ‘to know’ that the chosenposition is the best to receive food. It is also clear that dogsseem also to have learned that breaking with the strong ancestralpacking instinct (fig. 4) gives the advantage to get all the foodoffered without competitors.

This behaviour makes astonishing contrast with the humans, sincethey are frequently in groups (44.1%), sometimes in places wherecars don’t slow down.

In the way back the weather changed suddenly and rain came withheavy hail but the dogs were observed to remain still at theirplace.

Considering that the maximum score is 2, the mean score was 1.48and 0.65 for dogs and humans respectively. The difference washighly significant (P<0.001), showing that dogs rich an highefficacy of begging strategy (more then twice) while people show a

score very low that confirm why the difference previously observedin people location was not significant.

Fig. 5. The location score of dogs is more then twice in comparison with humans.

To explain the lower scoring of people it must be consideredthat children can share the coins received or bring them home tocontribute to family income. Also, may be, people dislike childrenstay alone and frequently make and adult person, generally an oldperson, to stay with them. But still remain that they frequentlywait in wrong positions and the differences are not significantwhile the wrong behaviour is very rare among dogs.

The same phenomenon, referred to another road of the country, isquoted also in a technical article on sanitary problems inBolivia, titling significantly “Begging dogs” to symbolize “themiserable human condition”, as specifically declared by the AA.The excerpt says: “A situation revealed everywhere, dogs included,from this the title, because from Sucre to La Palma (40 km alongthe Andean precordillera) there is a provincial road where beggingdogs are sitting about 500 metres from each other. They are ofdifferent breeds but all of them have the common trait of extremeskinniness. Lonely, they wait for the food thrown to them fromthe few vehicles crossing through: all of them defended itsterritory and we have seen, coming back after 8 hours, that theywere still there.“4

4 Perros mendigos [....] Una situación que trasunta por todos los rincones del país, incluso en losperros, de ahí nuestro titular: porque entre Sucre y La Palma (40 Km por la precordillera de los Andes) hayuna ruta provincial que tiene parados a los lados del camino y cada 500 metros aproximadamente a perrosmendigos, de diferentes razas aunque su característica común es su extrema flaqueza. Solitarios esperanque desde los pocos vehículos que transitan les arrojen alimentos: cada uno defiende su territorio y hemoscomprobado recorriendo el camino de ida y vuelta que tras 8 horas seguían ahí. La actitud de cada uno eradiferente: uno enfrentaba el vehículo obligándole a reducir la marcha, otro estaba parado con expresiónmelancólica, otro inquieto... Todas las características que se puedan imaginar. Es que en este territorioabandonado de la mano de Dios, hasta los perros imitan lo que hace la mayoría de gente (Grupo deAnálisis Sanitario de la SEMG, Perros mendigos, “Revista de la SEMG”, n. 58, nov,2003, pp. 596-601. www.medicinageneral.org/revista ).

The distance of 500 m indicated as separating dogs summariseswell and confirms the differences more analytically observed by usthat were more than 1.5-2 km as a mean, but only about 250 m whenthe winding road made the conditions very favourable to begging.

The quoted excerpt suggests different behaviours of dogs andeven cases of animals facing the cars to oblige them to slow down.Such differences were never observed by us. The only exception wasthe case of dog that, after having noticed the move of throwingbread, ran barking after the car for a while. Similarly aterritory defence was not noticed; on the contrary dogs looked toassume an ordered distribution nearly appearing coordinated.

It is difficult to explain the begging strategy of dogs basingit only on an instinctual behaviour. Dogs clearly understand thatonly if they are alone they can get all the food without needingto fight. As a consequence the appearance is as if a dog, when aplace is occupied, moves spontaneously to another place. Only adesirable long research on the place should show if a hierarchy doexist and the stronger animals take the better places at thewinding part of the road.

The second quotation confirms that the analysed behaviour ofdogs, though looking unnatural and learned, is not exceptionalsince it is also observed in another road in the altitudes. It issupposed a kind of symbiosis is learned: animals getting food andhumans getting the pleasure to feed the animals.

Conclusions

Andean dogs begging strategy has reached such a high level ofefficiency and diffusion to be described even in literature, as anastonishing behaviour, and in a technical essay, as a symbol ofhuman miserable life condition in Bolivia.

It is interesting to observe that the begging strategy of dogslooks much more efficient in comparison with people, inasmuch asthe latter place themselves in a wrong position 4.5 occurrencesmore frequently than dogs. They choose a correct location in x%while people do it only in y% of the occurrences. The evaluationby individual mean scoring (xx vs yy) makes still more evidentthis difference.

References

Néstor Taboada Terán, El precio del estaño, La Paz, Ed. Gisbert yCia., 1983.Grupo de Análisis Sanitario de la SEMG, Perros mendigos, “Revista de la SEMG”, n. 58, nov, 2003, pp. 596-601. www.medicinageneral.org/revista