A couple with 30 dogs and lots of other animals on their 24-acre farm has gained viral attention this week after one of their videos received over 130,000 views on TikTok.
Married couple Toni and Lydia have over 520,000 followers on TikTok where they post under the handle thedogmoms. The couple share highlights from their life on the farm with all of their animals.
The viral video shows off a living room packed with dogs—and even a few chickens—and has delighted TikTok users.
“That must be what heavens like,” said one viewer of the video. Another commenter wrote: “They all look happy and well taken care of. You’re living my dream. I’d have that many if it wasn’t for my husband.”
“I love the snugglefest they all have going on,” said another TikTok user after viewing the picture of all of the pups together.
“You can never have too many fur babies,” agreed another commenter.
Despite the dog food bills that must come with 30 canine friends, research published in the Psychological Science journal in 2021 suggests that our pups also exhibit jealous behavior. Just like human siblings, it is possible for dogs to show jealousy when their owner interacts with another dog.
To test how and when dogs display jealous behavior, researchers at the University of Auckland presented 18 dogs with situations that showed a social interaction between their owner and either a realistic fake dog or a fleece cylinder—with the fake dog serving as a rival pup and the cylinder as a control.
At first, dogs observed the fake dog positioned next to their human companion, before a barrier was placed between the real and fake dogs blocking the line of sight.
Dogs overwhelmingly rushed to get to their owner when they saw them stroke the rival fake dog behind the barrier, but in a repeat experiment, the dogs were less concerned when the fake dog was replaced with the control cylinder.
These results confirmed that dogs did in fact exhibit jealous behavior when they felt that their owner was socially interacting with another dog.
Other commenters were amazed at how the couple keep all of their pups happy, one user wrote: “Honestly, how? How are they all so chill? I can’t even get two dogs to chill,” while another said: “You’ re my hero.”
“Oh my god,” wrote another viewer of the viral video: “I am running to show my husband we are not alone! 9 dogs, 4 cats, 8 chickens, 4 ducks, a snake, 3 fish… I wouldn’t don’t change it.”
Newsweek you have reached out to thedogmoms for comment.
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