The Dog Lab

Welcome to the lab, summer interns! The Dog Lab turned 17 this June, and incidentally, we have 17 in person summer interns/ volunteers this year. There are several more working long distance.

Anindita Bhadra's talk at the ICAM Conference 2026 is now available online:

Co-Existence in Cities Professor Anindita Bhadra | Behaviour and Ecology Lab, Indian Insti...

The first non-dog paper from the lab is here as a preprint. Dishari Dasgupta has been working on understanding the dynamics between free-ranging langurs and dogs in the urban habitat.

Begging with a Purpose? Testing Behavioural Hallmarks of First-Order Intentionality in Free-ranging Hanuman Langurs Intentional communication has been studied extensively in primates, yet evidence from free-ranging non-ape species remains limited. Human-directed food-solicitation gestures in Hanuman langurs (Semnopithecus entellus) have recently been described, but whether these behaviours exhibit behavioural hal...

The first ever paper acceptance in Animal Behaviour. Another target journal ticked off. Congratulations Sourabh and team! This is the third paper to be accepted this year.

Let the dogs be on the streets! It's their home, they have been around forever. Let's learn to co-exist.

Just published in Ethology. The third publication of the year. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/eth.70081
Congratulations Srijaya Nandi and team!

Food, Affection and Gaze: Which Cues Do Free‐Ranging Dogs Prioritise for Engaging With Humans? Free-ranging dogs interact with humans regularly on the streets, depending on them for food and forming social bonds. We conducted an experiment to understand the hierarchy of human cues, if any, as ...

They are called "strays", but please remember, they are not. They are free-ranging dogs, who belong around us, among us. They are our friends for life, and sometimes they become superheroes.

Meet Kali: The guardian stray dog who died battling a venomous cobra to protect over 30 kindergarten children | - The Times of India Trending News: Stray dogs in India are often viewed with fear and suspicion. In recent years, reports of dog attacks have risen in cities and villages. PIB reports s.

Here is the second publication of the year from our lab. Congratulations Tuhin and team! Here we compare the lemon avoidance abilities of adult and juvenile FRDs.

Lemons and learning: Juvenile free‐ranging dogs are more persistent but less selective foragers than adults Free-ranging dogs in India are scavengers, dependent primarily on human-generated waste for food. They are efficient scavengers, navigating a noisy environment to find and consume their preferred foo...