Accueil - Animals - Left-handed horse, dog or cat: animals, to the left!
Date : 05 Apr 2025Categories : AnimalsEntertainmentNewsScienceUnusual
Left-handed dogs and cats: left-handedness is a subject of research interest, and not just in humans. I don’t know whether the researchers working on this subject are all left-handed and want to understand themselves better… The difference in laterality affects all living creatures, from the left-handed cat to the whale and perhaps the drosophila fly.
Horses are among the animals that show the greatest lateral preference for turning, moving and even lying down. This lateral preference needs to be considered in equestrian training to ensure balanced muscle development and optimum performance.
Horses are predominantly left-handed, whatever their breed, and this is not something to be overlooked when you are a rider: they may require specific training techniques to compensate for their natural preference. Careful trainers use targeted exercises to balance both sides of the horse.
Saddles are often not well adapted to nags, probably because they were designed by right-handers who simply hadn’t thought of it!
Over 40% of male cats are left-handed, while females are predominantly right-handed. This only serves to determine whether they use their kibble dispenser with their right or left paw… or to have more interaction with him by stimulating his left paw to his delight. Changes in paw preference could allow you to see if your cat has a problem.
As with left-handed cats, 30% of dogs are left-handed, again more often in males than females, but it also turns out that right-handed dogs are easier to train than left-handed ones. This information is extremely useful for training guide dogs – who would have thought!
Serious research has been carried out on small fish and birds to find out whether they are left – or right-handed, who knows why? Well, to study schools of fish and flocks of migratory birds, quite simply.
We’ve also noticed a marked laterality in parrots and parakeets, which use one leg to open seeds.
Do left-handed birds fall prey to left-handed cats more often?
We all followed with great anguish the forced celibacy of poor Jérémie, a left snail who was unable to reproduce. Spoiler, after an international appeal, a female or male companion was finally found, and they had a bunch of little snails, all right-handed!
The research doesn’t stop there: finicky blue whales are only left-handed when hunting at the surface, which is thought to be linked to their right eye looking at the prey and then turning left – you weren’t expecting that, little krill!
Our little champion is the bipedal kangaroo, which could become the totem animal for left-handed people: 99% of kangaroos are left-handed, and this is thought to be linked to the neuronal circuit that connects the hemispheres of their brains.
Researchers have shown that in most animals, the right eye is used to see prey, while the left eye is used in the event of danger. This was probably already the case in the days of the T. rex.
You probably don’t care about all this information, which probably won’t change your life, but which will enable you to interact better with your left-handed horse, dog or cat by taking its laterality into account: it will be all the more fulfilling (I haven’t found any studies on the laterality of guinea pigs, but there’s probably been a thesis on the subject).
As is often the case, research starts with animals and is then applied to humans. Why do you think so much interest has been shown in this brave Jérémie? Well, because some researchers have discovered a gene in snails that is also found in humans – yes, it’s all about genes again – that would explain why our organs are on the right or the left and why our intestines turn in a certain direction.
And all this may help you to shine at your next dinner in town.