Smart dog stories

I was puppy sitting a four month old lab while a friend was away for nine days. He had told me the commands that she knew, so while he was gone we worked on her recall. I would tell her to sit and wait, then walk to the end of the garage. I'd call her, she'd come to me, sit in front of me, make eye contact and get her treat. We did this three times. After the third time, she ate her treat, turned and walked away from me....and went to the other end of the garage to where I had left her sitting at the start of the exercise. She turned to face me and sat....she had set herself up to do the recall again. She did this many times, and I was more than happy to repeat the exercise with her.

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Originally Posted by BurlyGirl

I was puppy sitting a four month old lab while a friend was away for nine days. He had told me the commands that she knew, so while he was gone we worked on her recall. I would tell her to sit and wait, then walk to the end of the garage. I'd call her, she'd come to me, sit in front of me, make eye contact and get her treat. We did this three times. After the third time, she ate her treat, turned and walked away from me....and went to the other end of the garage to where I had left her sitting at the start of the exercise. She turned to face me and sat....she had set herself up to do the recall again. She did this many times, and I was more than happy to repeat the exercise with her.

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Now that's a smart dog for 4 months. ( My pup has started bowing whenever he is in trouble. How can I not smile? :) )

Charlie likes to go icefishing with me . I have a flasher sonar unit which shows the jig as I move it up and down and also when a fish comes up to grab the jig . He watches the flasher very intently and as soon as he sees a fish appear moving in on the jig he jumps back and barks at the hole . LOL . Crazy . LOL

TD

My dog acts very differently in the woods depending on wether or not I am carrying a gun. In the off season he tends to work much closer, almost not taking it serious. If I'm carrying a shotgun he is a totally different dog and just "turns it on". He get's walked daily but on Saturday mornings when everybody is sleeping in a bit he goes bonkers because he knows he gets a good 2 hour run in the woods every Saturday. As soon as I get dressed he's on the bed whining away. During th work week he just seems to accept that he will only get out after work.

My girl know the days of the week as well. Friday night she knows we go next door for a couple of "pops", she knows when the time is right and goes to the door and waits. When I go to the fridge, she runs back to see what I'm doing, if two brown bottles clink together, she runs back to the door and starts howling. As soon as the door opens, she runs out and over to the back door or my neighbor's garage.
The other thing she does, as soon as she sees me get out the suitcase for a business trip, she tries to lay across my feet to keep me from leaving!

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Originally Posted by 400bigbear

Charlie likes to go icefishing with me . I have a flasher sonar unit which shows the jig as I move it up and down and also when a fish comes up to grab the jig . He watches the flasher very intently and as soon as he sees a fish appear moving in on the jig he jumps back and barks at the hole . LOL . Crazy . LOL

TD

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Hilarious. Now if you could just get him to clean the fish. :)

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Originally Posted by welsh

I open cans of tuna with a Swiss Army knife -- long story, but I don't like how my can opener works. This is the only thing I use that knife for these days. And I give the dog the juice from the can.

She has learned to recognize my Swiss Army knife, and gets excited when I pick it up.

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Somehow mine knows the instant I grab the vegetable peeler. He runs into the kitchen, goes straight to the corner of the butcher block table and waits patiently for a piece of carrot. If he doesn't smell carrot, he'll sit there and huff in protest until I get one from the fridge. If there's carrot on the table, he drools quietly. And he actually moans in disappointment if I finish food prep without giving him a piece of carrot. He used to be worse about it though -- he used to try to lie on my feet while I was chopping vegetables so I wouldn't forget that he was (im)patiently waiting for carrot. (Had to break him of that, for obvious reasons...)

My setter knows we are going for a run as soon as I put my socks on. If I put on ankle socks or dress socks, he doesn't care. Put on hiking socks (or a hat) and he goes BONKERS. I try and trick him by closing the door while I change my socks but he still knows.

My Britt pup got some rare illness. My wife and I were both working out of home so I made up a safe area in the basement made up from plywood for this pup. I felt bad for the old girl so I took her from the kennel outside and gave her free range of the basement - outside of the barrier.
I came home one day to find one of my leather Italian shoes chewed to heck by the pup! I looked around trying to find how the pup got out of the barrier, found the shoe and then went back into the barrier!?!?! Assumed I was loosing my mind and walked away scratching my head.
The next day - ditto, another shoe from a separate pair!!! I scanned the basement trying to make sense of it! I asked my wife, "Did you leave my shoes near the pup?" I can't repeat her answer here. :(
I scanned the basement even slower and when my gaze came upon the older dog, she lowered her head. What?!?!?!
Oh yeah....she HATED having to share our attention with the new pup. She was delivering the shoes to pup and then skulking off to lie down as far away from pup as she could. I know....hard to believe.

Just an example of canine intelligence. In support of NZ animal shelters. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWAK0J8Uhzk

Enjoy!