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"I don't understand. But I don't care, so it works out."
(set 12 days ago)
35,641 posts, read 18,001,275 times
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I've had some SMART dogs, lots of stories to tell, but I'll limit it to one.
I had a little dog who would get nervous when we took out the suitcases and began packing. She didn't know whether she was going to the kennel, or going on the trip. We started saying "it's okay!! You get to go! You're coming with us!" when she was coming, and kind of shrugging our shoulders at her when she was going to the kennel.
After a couple cycles of this, on a trip where she was able to come on a family trip, I opened my suitcase when I got there. She had packed some of her toys in my suitcase!! Incredible. And, when I was packing up to leave, she packed her toys back in to go home.
Wow that’s freakin’ smart! I don’t know if this story is about smart or exceptionally clever.
My wife and I were newly married and in a 2 bedroom apartment. We really didn’t have much, but we did get a dog, a Basenji with some fairly new Congo bloodline. Her name was Tenika. Our first real Christmas we got a small live tree- maybe 5ft tops. We had little in the way of ornaments, maybe a couple three dozen, so my wife painstakingly threaded popcorn on thread with needle and wrapped the tree. She made some colored paper bows to fill in the gaps.
We went out shopping or something, came back home and was greeted by our dog. My wife said “something’s not right with the tree!?”. She then noticed all of the popcorn was gone, every piece, and not one ornament was disturbed.
We have no idea how she managed to do that, but that breed is a very, very clever one.
Status:
"I don't understand. But I don't care, so it works out."
(set 12 days ago)
35,641 posts, read 18,001,275 times
Reputation: 50687
Quote:
Originally Posted by Threerun
Wow that’s freakin’ smart! I don’t know if this story is about smart or exceptionally clever.
My wife and I were newly married and in a 2 bedroom apartment. We really didn’t have much, but we did get a dog, a Basenji with some fairly new Congo bloodline. Her name was Tenika. Our first real Christmas we got a small live tree- maybe 5ft tops. We had little in the way of ornaments, maybe a couple three dozen, so my wife painstakingly threaded popcorn on thread with needle and wrapped the tree. She made some colored paper bows to fill in the gaps.
We went out shopping or something, came back home and was greeted by our dog. My wife said “something’s not right with the tree!?”. She then noticed all of the popcorn was gone, every piece, and not one ornament was disturbed.
We have no idea how she managed to do that, but that breed is a very, very clever one.
Wow! A Basenji! That was the dog my family had when I was a child. I agree, they're incredibly clever. Their lack of trainability sometimes gives them low rankings in "intelligence" when dog breeds are ranked, but I agree they're really clever.
Wow! A Basenji! That was the dog my family had when I was a child. I agree, they're incredibly clever. Their lack of trainability sometimes gives them low rankings in "intelligence" when dog breeds are ranked, but I agree they're really clever.
We read some articles about that- the low intelligence score. It’s now fairly accepted that the breed, one of the oldest in the world, is actually very intelligent and highly adaptable to survival with minimal human assistance.
I found that Tenika would indeed hunt with me, but only if there was something in it for her. Who was training who? Lol.
First Dog, a "Sheprador," was incredibly smart. She knew over 200 words (I kept track) and could understand whole sentences. She knew the name of each of her toys and chewies. She had one of those hollow bones that you fill with treats, and she was looking for it downstairs. I happened to know it was upstairs in the bedroom, so I told her to go upstairs and find her bone. Up the stairs she ran, and we could hear her rummaging around, but then she came downstairs again, looking at us with her head cocked, "Hmmmmm?" She hadn't been able to find it. So I said, "Your bone is in the bedroom!" Back up she went, and we could hear her go straight to the master bedroom. And then she came running downstairs with the bone in her mouth, ready for it to be filled. She knew "Go get," "upstairs," 'bedroom," and "bone," and she was able to put those together into a mental image.
They say that only humans can do symbolic thinking, where one word or thing stands for another. I believe that First Dog could do it, too. We used to save the cardboard tubes inside paper towels (they were really sturdy in those days) and fill them with small milkbones for her and close up the ends. She'd tear the tube open, like a gift package. So one night we'd run out of tubes, and since it was a tradition that she'd get one for dessert after her dinner, she was very frustrated. The milkbones alone didn't do it for her. She disappeared into one of the bathrooms, and emerged with a toilet paper tube from the waste basket, and came over and presented it to us: Here! Like this!Fill! Please! She would ordinarily never go through the trash, and she obviously knew that it wasn't the right kind of tube, and she knew we didn't keep her tubes in the bathroom waste basket but in the kitchen cabinet, but I believe she wanted to tell us that she wanted something like that toilet paper tube. We were absolutely floored. The little tube was a symbol of the big tube! In a way she was drawing a picture for us. I think I just ripped all the paper off the kitchen paper towel roll so she could have her evening tube!
Once when it was particularly snowy and cold, our family Golden Retriever, who NEVER wandered off or disobeyed a recall, ran down the street and into the night, ignoring all calls to return. We went out to look for him and he was standing over a woman who was semi-conscious in a snowbank. She was hypothermic and being covered in snowfall, and had he not brought attention to her it's very likely she wouldn't have been found any time soon, let alone found alive.
Also, this isn't quite as heroic but I sure do appreciate it: I've had night terrors all my life, but my Standard Poodle now awakens me before they can get going. Haven't suffered a full-blown one since he started doing this as an adolescent pup, except on an occasion where I was traveling without him.
This is not my dog but one who I loved. In the city that I grew up in, the dogs were free to roam around. My ex-boyfriend's dog would go to all of his friend's houses looking for him. When we would drop by one of the houses, they would say, "Hey! Your dog was just here looking for you." I thought that was the funniest, smartest thing.
The other thing he would do is get in your way if you tried to leave my ex-boyfriend's childhood home. He would expect to be petted.
I had an insanely smart mixed breed. She could houdini her way out of any enclosure. But the thing she did that amazed me: We were taking a tricks class, the class was just us and one other dog with his family. The instructor showed us how to teach the dogs to put their chin down while lying down. Then she said, ok, try it with your dogs. I started to show Sienna but she gave me a look like "hold on just a minute." She then looked over at the other team and watched them practice the trick three times. Then looked back at me like "ok, I'm ready!" I gave the hand signal, and she put her head right down perfectly. After that she knew the trick....she literally learned it by watching the other dog learn it. Still blows me away to think about it.
My Cocker mix Zulu used to know whether I was going to work, or a "doggable" trip based on what I was wearing. Hose and pumps = no reason to get excited. Boots or Tennis shoes = that's a doggable trip!
Our current Pyrenese/Anatolian LGD scratches at the door like she wants out when she wants to eat. It's a three step process because she has to scratch at the door and get the Corgis to want to go with her, but it's a fake. When we open the door and they run out, she turns around and goes to where her food bowl is stashed. She needs us to put them out so we can feed her.
What's the smartest thing my dogs have ever done? Adopt me!
LOL!
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