Study: Docking dogs’ tails makes them mean

VICTORIA, British Columbia, March 24 (UPI) — Cutting off a dog’s tail deprives it of communication ability and makes it become more aggressive, Canadian researchers in British Columbia report.

Biologist Tom Reimchen and graduate student Steve Leaver of the University of Victoria used a robotic dog with exchangeable regular and bobbed tails to study 492 dogs’ reactions in the summer of 2006 in off-leash environments, The Times-Colonist, a newspaper in Victoria, reported.