Is your dog smart?

[Gempress]

A friend of mine was mentioning to her coworkers that I had a blackmouth cur. One of her coworkers is familiar with the breed, and he laughed and said "You know those dogs are dumb, right?"

And he's right. I can't deny it. Zeus is sweet, lovable, and gorgeous. But he's admittedly a few tacos short of a combo plate. It took him two weeks of repetitive sessions to learn "sit". And he's not really much of a problem solver. Voodoo, on the other hand, is smart. He's very good at problem solving and getting into mischief.

So let's be honest. Is your dog smart or "intellectually recessive"?

 

[wcladymacbeth]

Maggie isn't *the* smartest dog in the world, but she is pretty smart. Clumsy though. Always hitting her head on something. So she's probably a little less smart than she might've been if there weren't all these dumb tables and doors getting in her way!

 

[Buddy'sParents]

All three are too smart for my own good.

 

[Dekka]

Dekka is brilliant. And Bounce just absorbs training. Kaiden is not the brightest, neither is Zo. Snip is very smart but not easy to train. (there being a large difference between ease of training and brains)

 

[Gempress]

Snip is very smart but not easy to train. (there
being a large difference between ease of training and brains)

You're sooo right. That's exactly how Voodoo is. He's brilliant when figuring out how to open doors and get at things he's not suppossed to, but was a real challenge to obedience train.

 

[Zoom]

Both of these dogs are too smart for their own good. I used to think Virgo was pretty dumb until I hit on what really makes her tick for training and Sawyer just picks up everything.

 

[Laurelin]

Trey is dumb.... really he is. Actually, I don't think he's dumb, he's just got NO common sense, NO problem solving skills, and NO intuition particularly when it comes to reading others. Commands, though? Those are fine. He's a very easy dog to train. Input food, output command type dog.

Rose is pretty darn smart. She's shy about training and very timid, but she's manipulative at times and really has great 'common sense'. She also seems to just get the way everything works. She can trick the other dogs out of toys and food easily. and the whole time she just looks so sweet and innocent doing it!

Beau is also smart, but he doesn't think before acting many a time. He gets excited and then the brain goes out the window. He has the best sense of people though of any dog I've ever met. He's one that always seems to be reading what you're thinking. He has the biggest vocabulary of any dog I've had either. He knows way too many words so we have to sidestep that all the time by spelling things out (which he's now figured out).

Summer, I love so much. She is the easiest dog to train. Just has great motivation. I however, don't think she's as smart as the other two. She is soooo sweet and sensitive to me and my moods, but just lacks the 'street smarts' the others seem to have.

Nik was the best kind of smart- the independent, 'I don't give a ****' type. She knew how to get her way. She'd manipulate rules and do things on purpose in just a way she knew she could get away with it. If you were training her, you could forget it unless there was something in it for her and she felt like training. With her it was always a privilege just to be in her presence. She let you know that all the time.

 

[Gempress]

Here's an example of Zeus' mental capacity: he has yet to grasp the concept of "above his head". If it's over his eye level, it does not exist.

My mom was on a pretty high stepladder in our house one day, helping us paint. Zeus came cruising into the room. Mom called to him. Zeus looked around, but didn't see her. So Mom called some more. Zeus ended up running in frantic circles around and around the ladder, whining with excitement and looking everywhere but up. We were dying of laughter. I had to forcibly grab his head and make him look skyward.

He did something similar with a cat in the yard. Zeus went chasing after it, and the cat jumped up on the fence. Zeus was sniffing all around that part of the fence, trying to figure out where the kitty had gone. In the meantime, Kitty was sitting right on top of the fence just a few feet above his head. I swear the cat was laughing at him. And poor Zeus never did figure it out.

 

[Gustav]

Gus is incredibly smart and anxious to please, which is a GREAT combo when it comes to teaching him ridiculous things..

I always thought Perle was a bit simple, but in actual fact I feel she's the smarter of the two.. She knows that even if she doesn't do all the timewasting trick performing, she's going to get a treat at some point or another anyway.. She's quick enough to work out how to open cupboard doors to get at dried pasta, or even flour.. Even with child locks..

 

[milos_mommy]

Milo's VERY smart and VERY trainable.

Benji is just like Lauren's Trey. NO social skills, no common sense, no problem solving. But it's not too hard to train him things like sit and down because anything that = treat is going to happen 900000 times a day.

 

[Jared.]

Bella is smart and impossible to train. Best combo

She knows when you are using treats to train and when you aren't. She knows quite a few commands but will never respond to any unless it is beneficial to her. She sneaks around and gets into things she shouldn't but if you are watching her she won't do a thing wrong. She has different levels of obedience for myself, my wife, my father and my brother. She knows what she can get away with and with whom.

 

[dr2little]

I think all of mine are smart, and I don't mean well trained as much as I mean smart. The least 'smart' is Lola, though she too is a problem solver and if there is something to be gained or anything standing in the way of her and 'the prize' she'll figure her way through most problems. Lola does not read situations like the rest of my group, maybe her lack of proper socialization...kind of dim when it comes to body language from people or dogs.

Amos is a total brain. He learns things so quickly and is extremely easily motivated by so many things. I really should spend more time teaching him silly pet tricks.. He came with me to do a dry run with our new agility equipment and mastered each piece in no time. He's a bit of a dare devil.

Sophie is a deep thinker to a fault. There is a flip side to her brain that causes her to overthink things.....her motto "fool me once, shame on you...fool me twice...we'll you get the idea. Nothin' gets past my girl..

Tia and Tinker, both very smart but also easily trained. I've been able to teach each of them complex chain behaviors in nothing flat. They've also used interactive toys like big dogs their entire lives...

I have had some dogs that when I think back, all I can say is ..."bless their hearts".. More like walking, pooping, stuffed toys who's biggest goal in life is to be cuddled.

 

[Jules]

T-Bone is .... yes, she is eager to please. I mean, for a terrier that is

She's not the brightest bulb either. She's clumsy. She runs into furniture, walls, fences, street lamps. But I love her.

 

[mrose_s]

Buster is very smart, he can catch onto most things wuickly, its just his choice whether or not he actually complies with them then. He's stubborn as hell but very well behaved.

Sophie is extremly bright, like can understand entire sentences of english, she can be quiet odd osmetimes and picks up on a lot of things.

Harry... he's not the brightest spark but he's trainable and likes to do the right thing.

Mac is amazingly quick witted, she's very bright, she was doing an entire run of flyball including using the spring board after her first lesson (we had doen about a week of training her over 2 jumps and back at home previously though)
but she's a bimbo other times, runs into things, falls down, barks at us when we tap the wall and call "hello" and she's watching us lol

 

[DanL]

Gunnar is amazingly smart. He learns quickly - most new tasks are learned in minutes with very few reps. He's a problem solver, and he will totally anticipate your next move and be one step ahead of you. However, he's also learned that if he can't get to something- a toy out of his reach or whatever, he will come and ask for help. He's manipulative in that way.

Daisy is smart. It takes her longer to learn things but she's an amazing problem solver. She will open doors so she can see you. For example, she opens the garage door when I go out there to work on something. She doesn't have to come out in the garage, she just wants the door open so she can check on me. She will completely work out on her own getting a ball out from underneath something (3' long legs helps ). She taught herself how to open the toy box to get toys out (check in the training forum for the training contest #3). One night we had eaten dinner and she had her eye on my wife's scraps. After a few minutes of body language- looking at my wife, then at the food, over and over, she went and got a toy, gave it to my wife, as if to offer a trade for the food. That's problem solving skills to me, she wanted something and did what she thought would get it for her.

Bruzer- dumb as a box of rocks. He's an inquisitive little guy but it takes him forever to learn a task. We'd been working on having him "speak" for his entire life of 6 years- so much that our parrot will go thru the whole routine, in my daughter's voice. "speak, speak, speak" He finally started to do it, once Daisy was learning. He saw her getting treats for barking and he finally figured it out. He does a good sit and a good stay and that's about it.

Buzz is pretty smart. We haven't done much with him aside from teaching him that humping your leg and chasing the cat are not good. He'll sit nice for his dinner, and he knows what "go to bed" means when we need to crate him. He's so skittish though, that it's hard to bring him out of his shell unless all the other dogs are not around. I try and give him one on one time every day though.

 

[smkie]

Mary's Mom tate was like zuess. I think because she was so sick for so long when she was born, my miracle baby. There was a price to pay for surviving. Mary is wise, Victor is smart as a whip, and Pepper is a never ending surprise at what she is capable of.
smart dog story

At the guild tues a woman was preparing some tiles to raku. Victor came up and nudged her and she pushed his head. He nudged her again, not hard, one thing i didn't train him not to do because it makes him a good therapy dog. SHe pushed him again. I said why don't you just tell him to go. When i said the word he whipped around and left the room immediantly which made her husband's eye brows go up, all the while she was explaining to me how she was doing some dominant dog nonsense teaching technique unaware that he had already left the second i said the word. Guess she didn't know he understands english just fine.

 

[perla123]

I think both of my dogs are smart, but I think that Kiana is sneaky smart. She knows how to go and do bad things without us knowing. And RB is more like human smart. Realy I think some times he is just going to get up on two legs and just start walking and talking to us.

Kiana is funny b/c when she needs to go and do her thing is like she literally talks to us.

 

[StillandSilent]

Lilly is very smart. She has good problem solving skills, a great memory and is very motivated to learn. Training her was an absolute breeze, and at 13 she is still learning new tricks.
Radar...well, we didn't choose him for brains, and it shows. Great little dog, but he failed puppy kindegarten twice, even though we worked on stuff every single day. At 10, he has his basic obedience skills down, he can speak on command and has just mastered roll over. Shaking paws is apparently beyond him, becasue we've been trying for almost 9 years without any progress at all. The sad part is, he's incredibly motivated, by food, toys, affection, you name it. He just doesn't seem to be able to make the mental connections. Poor dim little guy.

 

[adojrts]

Petie is brilliant, easy to train but just as fast figures out how it can fit his agenda. He is also a manipulator and has some interesting and complex ways of telling me what he wants or needs.
Hailey, no moss on her either, very smart and easy to train but not nearly as challenging as her son Petie.

Bobbi, smart and easy, also a Hailey son. Goofy as all hell though:rofl1:

Sprout is totally socially inept with other dogs, as for training to be honest although she is willing and keen I haven't done a lot with her, but she isn't stupid.

Kiah appears to be smart, how smart I don't know yet, she is young and doesn't have much training, but the little that I have done with her has been picked up quickly plus she has excellent social skills with all dogs.

Luckily I have never had a jrt that was a dumb as a stump and hope I never do lol.

 

[Kela]

My chihuahua is *the* dumbest dog that I have ever met. Ever. We had a 2 hour training class (he was 2 or 3 at the time) and out of all the dogs that were there, he was the ONLY dog that failed to learn a single trick. We were learning how to use the clicker and there was a mixture of breeds and ages there, but every single one of those animals ran circles around my chi. Even the instructor came over and tried without success.

I would seriously challenge people to a "dumbest dog" contest with this guy. He is as lovable and affectionate as they come, but man, is he lacking in the brains department.