What was the first animal to be domesticated by humans?
Domestication
The dog was the first domesticated vertebrate,[9][10][11] and was established across Eurasia before the end of the Late Pleistocene era, well before cultivation and before the domestication of other animals.[10] The archaeological and genetic data suggest that long-term bidirectional gene flow between wild and domestic stocks – including donkeys, horses, New and Old World camelids, goats, sheep, and pigs – was common.[7][12] Given its importance to humans and its value as a model of evolutionary and demographic change, domestication has attracted scientists from archaeology, palaeontology, anthropology, botany, zoology, genetics, and the environmental sciences.[13] Among birds, the major domestic species today is the chicken, important for meat and eggs, though economically valuable poultry include the turkey, guineafowl and numerous other species. Birds are also widely kept as cagebirds, from songbirds to parrots. The longest established invertebrate domesticates are the honey bee and the silkworm. Terrestrial snails are raised for food, while species from several phyla are kept for research, and others are bred for biological control.
Mallard
Mallards have often been ubiquitous in their regions among the ponds, rivers, and streams of human parks, farms, and other man-made waterwayseven to the point of visiting water features in human courtyards.
Mallards have had a long relationship with humans. Almost all domestic duck breeds derive from the mallard, with the exception of a few Muscovy breeds. Mallards are generally monogamous while domestic ducks are mostly polygamous. Domestic ducks have no territorial behaviour and are less aggressive than mallards. Domestic ducks are mostly kept for meat, as their eggs have a strong flavor. They were first domesticated in Southeast Asia at least 4,000 years ago, during the Neolithic Age, and were also farmed by the Romans in Europe, and the Malays in Asia. It is common for mallards to mate with domestic ducks and produce hybrid offspring that are fully fertile. Because of this, mallards have been found to be contaminated with the genes of the domestic duck.