With enough patience, you can breed an animal to do almost anything. When medieval Norwegians wanted help hunting puffins, which nest in cliffs and burrows, they created the Norwegian lundehund, which is practically a puffin-hunting machine. A lundehund can close its ears, turn its forelegs at right angles to its sides, and bend its head backward until its forehead touches its back. Plus it has an extra toe.

When the puffin hunters switched to nets, the breed nearly disappeared — by World War II there were only six left. But now they’re back up to around 2,000. Waste not, want not.