How much does your dog understand?
One thing that's been amazing me about Tucker is how he catches on to certain things. I'm a first-time dog owner and while I never really believed the stereo-typical "dogs are dumb", I find myself still quite amazed at how he seems to understand so many things. Now, of course, this is because we "taught" him but it just seems that I'll throw something at him and he's thinking very hard...  (edited to add: by "throwing" something at him, I meant "doing" something different to see what he does; like asking him "Where's Tucker?" or standing on a chair while we're playing just to see what he does... I don't literally "throw things at him!" )
He can go up to each one of my kids & hubby when asked "Where's so-and-so?" If they're not there he'll go look out the window. He's pretty darn near perfect with this, occassionally looking out the window when someone is, let's say, in the kitchen. When I ask him, "Where's Tucker?" -- he starts a bit and then stops and looks at me. He won't go running to the window... I can ask him if he wants some peanut butter and he'll go bounding to the fridge; same with "ice." For bananas, he'll head to where we keep the bananas. For cookies, he'll head to where we keep the cookies (liver cookies, of course!) I can even (most times) narrow him down to whether he needs to go outside to urinate or defecate! He barks when I hit the right one. Again, not perfectly but, wow, sometimes I'm amazed... "Do you want to play?" will invoke a barking "yes", sometimes with a jump, and he'll go off to find a toy to bring it to me. "Where's your xyz toy?" will invoke searching for toys; sometimes he gets it right; sometimes not. After heavy playing, I say, "Time for water!" and he'll immediately drop the toy and head for the sink. I get my water and then fill up his dish. Anyway, just wanted to share and I wonder if others have the same experience... 
Suzanne |
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| Suzanne -
I get such a smile out of your stories of Tucker! And I couldn't agree more - especially about sheepies - that dogs are far from dumb! Guinevere learned somehow, very early on, to go and do her "job" of finding a certain toy. Now she almost always gets exactly the right missing toy! "Where's your sheepie?" (This is a weird stuffed thing with twisted yarn handles on it and rasta hair that we call the "rasta sheepie") and she will go and find only that toy, past all the others. Keep us posted on Tucker's newest antics! Cheers! Guinevere's Dad, Kevin Z. |
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