Do dogs have belly buttons?

A friend recently bought a puppy, which is great. I can go over to his house, pat the dog, look at the dog and not have to worry at all about things like training it to go to the toilet in particular locations. As we stood over the belly-up puppy my friend asked a question, “do dogs have belly buttons?”

“They must!” I exclaimed. They’re mammals. We looked at the puppy. “Where is it then?” asked my friend. We would have just had to wonder about this in an age gone by, but now we have all this information readily available through a quick Google. Placental mammals have belly buttons. So a platypus or an echidna would not have a belly button, but a whale or a dog would.

We could hardly make out a belly button on the puppy, but believed in Google that it was there. Belly buttons are a lot easier to see on animals without hair like dolphins or hairless cats. It’s kind of weird to see dolphins having belly buttons, but that might just be me.

This little experience just highlighted to me that other people have a lot of questions and insights that I never think of. I never even asked myself that question. It’s important to remember that I can broaden my point of view by taking on board what other people bring to the table.