Question

The dog family is Canidae. Some well-known members of the dog family are the domestic dog, Canis familiaris; the coyote, Canis latrans; and the red fox, Vulpes fulva. If this classification represents phylogenetic relationships among the three species, we can conclude that the people who gave these animals these names concluded that __________.

a. domestic dogs evolved from coyotesb. domestic dogs and coyotes have a different ecological niche than foxesc. the common ancestor of coyotes and domestic dogs is more recent than the common ancestor of foxes and domestic dogsd. foxes are more closely related to dogs than they are to coyotes

Answer 1

The correct answer is c. the common ancestor of coyotes and domestic dogs is more recent than the common ancestor of foxes and domestic dogs

Step-by-step explanation:

The Canidae family includes foxes, wolves, coyotes, jackals, foxes, and domestic dogs. Both dogs and coyotes are evolved from ancient wolves and all three can interbreed to produce hybrids.

Dogs are evolved from gray wolves and then domesticated by humans. Humans did the selective breeding of dogs which resulted in artificial evolution of dogs.

Coyotes are evolved from eucyon which was a primitive wolf. Most scientists believe that C. lepophagus is the ancestor of wolves, coyotes, and dogs. Red fox can not interbreed with dogs, coyotes, and wolves that shows that it does not share a more recent ancestor with these three.

Therefore, the correct answer is c.