Make sure you spell V-E-T in front of your dog

[Spathiphyllum]

Dog lovers might be interested in this if they wonder why their pet runs when they hear bath, pill, or vet.

Research Shows Dogs Understand Language

So spell 'em out... don't enunciate lest you get frazzled by pursuit.

[Piyer]

I was just reading that report on the CNN website. No new news there, my german shepherd convinced us a long time ago that he's more than just a "dumb dog." His first day home (he was about 19 weeks at the time) we used a folded card table on its side and some boxes to block him out of a hallway. It didn't take him long to figure out that if he jumped onto a box first he could scale the table.

I swear, there are days when I think that he is smarter than me.

[Spathiphyllum]

Piyer says "I swear, there are days when I think that he is smarter than me."

So Piyer, does that mean you figured out how to scale the table?

I remember having discussions in front of the pooch (no, not with the dog) and saying the word "bath". I know he tilted his head and perked his ears on that one. And "outside"... that made him look for the leash.

[Ron]

My dog was so smart and so dumb...

If I asked him to go get his leash, he'd go right for it, pick it up and bring it to me, then drop it so that I couldn't reach it. Never could train him perfectly to hold it... he was always soooooo excited to "go for a walk", which is also a phrase that he understood to mean the same thing.

The leash was always kept in the smae place, on the floor next to the central staircase in the house.

If I said "Want to go for a walk" he would get hugely excited and if repeated, eventually he'd go and get his leash. If you asked him for his leash he'd get it. If we were upstairs, and asked him to go get his leash, he would go to the same place upstairs as the leash was downstairs, next to the staircase. He'd look all around for it, not realizing he was on the wrong floor (which didn't look anything like each other). Bizarre.

HE would also learn people by their name very quickly. Just say "Go see <name>" and lead him, by pointing or by leash, to that person once or twice, and he knew what theat meant from then on, and would go and look for (in the current room only) that person, and if spotted , would go to him/her.

On the other hand, in the 10 years we had him, with constant, consistent, frequent, training, he NEVER learned not to be grabby for food. Many people lost fingers to him, not from aggression but just enthusiasm. That's why it takes me so long to type... only have two thumbs and one pinky left.

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Ron
If I asked him to go get his leash, he'd go right for it, pick it up and bring it to me, then drop it so that I couldn't reach it... Many people lost fingers to him, not from aggression but just enthusiasm. That's why it takes me so long to type... only have two thumbs and one pinky left.

LOL

I'm wondering if he was trying to tell you that "yes, I want to go for a walk and, no, I don't want to wear that stinkin' restraint to do it!" Or maybe he was training you to get the leash, the assumption being that you keep asking for the leash but not getting it yourself. He was just showing you where it was.

The name recognition is pretty impressive. Heck, I have trouble with names.

[jason]

My family's dog is the same way. She knows her toys by name (if you say "where's your ring" she'll come back with her rubber ring and if you say "where's your ball" she'll find a ball--it could be a rubber ball or tennis ball, she knows the general concept of "ball"). She knows the word "walk" and gets excited whenever she hears it (or whenever she see's my mom put on sneakers). Evidently when you say "Jason's coming home" she goes balistic, too because she likes it when she gets to see me.

On the other hand, my family has a lot of land out in the country and get a lot of wildlife going through the back yard. They have a flock of wild turkeys that frequent the yard. Now wild turkeys are smart, brave birds. They knew exactly where the limits of the dog's runner were (my family just lets her run free now that she's getting older and doesn't wander into the streams anymore) and they would stand right at the edge of where she could reach every morning. Every day the dog would go outside, see the turkeys, and take off after them. And every day we'd hear the snap as she got to the end of her line at top speed before getting to those turkeys. Its amazing that she never broke her neck.

--Jason

[Ron]

Funny you should mention turkeys....:

Does this look like one of those to you?

I've been calling it a turkey....

Caution: nearly 900K in size

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by Ron
...turkeys...Does this look like one of those to you?

Looks like a turkey, walks like a turkey, squawks like a turkey, it's... :smilie_fldinner!

[jason]

Yep, that looks like a turkey to me. (The video wouldn't play over my 100Mbps connection earlier at work, but works great over my 3Mbps (if I'm lucky) connection at home.) I can't tell if it is a tom or a hen from the video (I don't have a very well trained eye), but from my experience, toms tend to wander alone while hens tend to be in groups, so my guess would be that that one's a tom. He also looks kind of big, helping my theory, but again it is hard to tell from the video.

Incidently, my step dad hunts. My mom doesn't mind that, but she won't let him hunt the turkeys or deer on our own property (12.5 acres, mostly wooded, surrounded by several more acres of woods that the state owns) because those are "[her] animals."

--Jason

[jason]

Originally posted by Spathiphyllum
Looks like a turkey, walks like a turkey, squawks like a turkey, it's... :smilie_fldinner!

Using that gun on a turkey wouldn't get you very much dinner I'm afraid to say....

--Jason

[lokki]

One of my dogs is much more 'dog' than the other... extremely predictable behaviours, long learning curve, but extremely adept at 'dog' things, like chasing a ball and donning the vacant stare. We've had him for about two years, rescued from a vet's office.

The other one is almost embarassing in her non-dog ways... likes to chase the ball, but is always trying to predict where it's going rather than actually watching it... We've had her about 6 years.

Anyway, when we were living in rental houses (read: no dog door), we hung a bell by the back door, which she'd ring when she needed to go to the euphemism (reference, anyone?). The louder the ring, the more urgent the call.

She can also distinguish between items, recognizes a concept of 'ball' and will even get a particular one if you point and tell her 'that one'. For a while, we had her cleaning up her own toys, but with the 2nd dog around dragging them out of the basket as soon as she puts them away, they started fighting, so we stopped that trick.

I'm currently working on her getting me a beer from the fridge - but she has trouble opening the door. When she tugs on the rope, it opens with a jerk and startles her, at which point she forgets the rest of the job.

[Spathiphyllum]

Originally posted by lokki - quotes in bold

...For a while, we had her cleaning up her own toys, but with the 2nd dog around dragging them out of the basket as soon as she puts them away, they started fighting, so we stopped that trick.
So you couldn't make them stand in the corner to teach them to play nice?

I'm currently working on her getting me a beer from the fridge... When she tugs on the rope, it opens with a jerk and startles her, at which point she forgets the rest of the job.
You're not supposed to forget the rest of your job until you've actually ingested the beer, not merely attempted to acquire it. Bad dog.

[Connie]

I think dogs are smart. I don't think they understand words the same way we do. I believe they understand sounds and assoicate an action with the sound.

For instace the word "Toy" means one thing to me. The word would have a different meaning to "Teddy" based on how I have used the word with him.

On the other hand if I say, "Find Toy, and have helped Teddy learn what to do when I say find toy, then he will find toy" .

It's a matter of repetition. The dog hears a certain word pattern and assoiciates an action with the word pattern.

On the other hand that is the way we learn the meaning of words. I think we undersand words a little different than dogs or horses do, but I know they learn the concept.

[Chappy]

C--A--S--T--R--A--T--E

[Spathiphyllum]

Chappy,

LOL. Yes, that one should be spelled and not enunciated in front of all males, all species.