Research: Dogs Align with Earth's Magnetic Field to ... Um ... Poop and Pee

You may be aware that the earth's magnetic field plays an important role for many animals on the planet, helping with navigation, for example, in some animals that are sensitive to the field.

Now, research has shown that dogs are among those animals. The direction in which dogs squat to pee or poop aligns with the north-south axis of the field, according to researchers.

Yes, you heard right. How'd you like to be the one charged with doing this research? The website Frontiers in Zoology recently published an abstract of the research, which explains the methodology:

We measured the direction of the body axis in 70 dogs of 37 breeds during defecation (1,893 observations) and urination (5,582 observations) over a two-year period.

Two years of watching dogs do their business, all in the name of science!

You'll have to take a look at the abstract if you want to know why such research was undertaken, and what it might mean.

(HT: Boing Boing)