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I adopted an Australian Shepherd from a friend a year ago and I'm absolutely blown away by how smart he is. He even knows the neighbor dogs' names. I can say "g

I adopted an Australian Shepherd from a friend a year ago and I'm absolutely blown away by how smart he is. He even knows the neighbor dogs' names. I can say "go get spot!" and he'll run after the right dog. He knows all my family members names. He knows that "you've arrived" on Google maps means we are there. He knows that "power on" coming from my Bluetooth headphones means we are going for a walk. He gets the concept for new tricks in about a half hour. I do have to practice them daily, but he gets the gist almost immediately. I knew Aussies were smart and I'm not sure where he is on the bell curve, but yeah, some dogs really have a knack for language.

sophacles 3y ago
A good friend of mine had an Aussie who was really smart. My friend was a dog trainer, and she once told me "the secret is Grace (the dog) does most of it - the puppies learn better by watching her demonstrate, and she keeps them in line". One day a mutual friend of ours died in a car wreck. I went to see my friend and we were sitting there telling stories and grieving... Grace read the room and brought my friend her favorite movie on dvd - something she watched when she was feeling blue. Grace wasn't quite sure what to do for me, but she brought me the cup I usually drank from when I was visiting. I don't know how much of that to attribute to smarts, training, and/or natural empathy, but that was an impressive dog, and its an impressive breed for sure!
- bongodongobob 3y ago
  I believe it. Apparently that's how herding dogs train on farms. You just buy a puppy and it literally shadows the adult. They train themselves.
  - RoyalHenOil 3y ago
    I have two koolies (an Australian herding breed that is very closely related to Australian shepherds, border collies, and kelpies). I got my older dog during the lockdowns when I had a lot of free time to train him, and I got my younger dog a couple years later, when I had much less time to train her. The younger one has taught herself almost everything the older one knows, mostly by observing him, but sometimes by him actively trying to teach her. When she doesn't know something, he shows obvious signs of frustration and urging: I give a command, he does the thing I'm asking for, she doesn't react because she doesn't know the command, and then he starts growling and harumphing (and sometimes even air snaps near her face to get her attention) until she follows his lead.
  - VHRanger 3y ago
    Herding is a self rewarding behavior for herding breeds. You can train herding by simply stopping the herding when he messes up (negative punishment). As long as he does it correctly he keeps doing it (positive reinforcement). For my border collie it's similar in agility. He doesn't care about treats and barely needs toys - doing the agility is the reward for learning it for him
  - adishy 3y ago
    Transfer learning on (cute) biological neural nets!
spike021 3y ago
I have a Shiba Inu and he's very much the same. If I say "look there's your friend Bella!" He goes nuts because that's his favorite friend to play with. He can even recognize the sound of their owner from multiple apartment buildings away. Not kidding at all. He'll go frantic begging to go outside and as soon as we're out he'll perk his ears, figure out the direction to go, and take off. And then after five or so mins heading that way he finds his best bud.
- bongodongobob 3y ago
  Cool! Mine can hear my neighbors garage door open when they get home from work and goes nuts because his bestie is about to be let outside. Took me a while to figure that one out, haha. "How the hell are you predicting when the neighbors dog gets let out??"
- cj 3y ago
  My Shiba has learned the days of the week. I have a family member that visits every Thursday, and he sits by the door waiting for them (only on Thursdays). And god forbid I work a weekend or do something off schedule, he gets stressed out thinking something is wrong. I often joke he would be a more normal dog if he had a lobotomy. Sometimes I wish he were a bit dumber :)
  - pilaf 3y ago
    That's amazing. Have you looked up whether this ability has been observed in other dogs? Do you think your Shiba is counting the days, or maybe there is something different about Thursdays (besides your family member visiting) that's giving him a hint?
    - maxerickson 3y ago
      Can maybe be something like a garbage truck.
      - cj 3y ago
        Lucky guess! I take the garbage out on Thursdays :) I doubt the dog is actually keeping track of the days. Definitely picks up cues from my own behavior based on the day/schedule, like taking the garbage out.
legohead 3y ago
I had a dumb labrador that was hard to train. Now I have a kokoni who knows 20 commands & words, and she is super easy to train. We haven't tried to test the limit of her abilities, we just ran out of things to teach her (that we cared about, at least). She never cared for toys though. I noticed while teaching her to "speak" that she would sneeze a lot, I guess it's kind of a reflex for her when she tries to speak. So I wondered, can I teach a dog to sneeze? And sure enough, after a bit of training, she will now sneeze on command.
- user_7832 3y ago
  > she would sneeze a lot Btw dogs often do this to indicate they're playing/mean no harm :)
  - raffraffraff 3y ago
    I have had greyhounds and lurchers, and every one of them does it. It's not a full sneeze, I call it a "snit" because that's what it sounds like. They're large dogs, so when they're being playful, jumping around and play fighting, we sometimes tell them "no!" is they're about to knock something over. This always gets us a "snit". The yawn thing that someone else mentioned is also common. If they are displeased with you, you get a yawn. Like if you ask them to do something (sit, paw etc) too many times and they're bored of you, you'll get an exaggerated vocal yawn. And the last one I'll mention, because it's so common in all dogs I've seen, is the shake. Directly after a tense situation, they shake, like they do when they're drying themselves. For example, if you're walking your dog and they encounter another dog that is larger, or a breed that they don't know or don't trust, they'll sometimes do a quick shake a few seconds after the encounter. I always reward the shake with a treat, to tell them "good dog, you kept your shit together in a stressful situation". A trainer told me to do that when I had a grey who had very bad social anxiety, and it really worked.
    - precompute 3y ago
      (Human) Kids shake too! You can try it yourself, it does work.
deergomoo 3y ago
My dog occasionally forgets our house has an upstairs. He's still a good boy though.
- RussianCow 3y ago
  Nice to meet you, fellow labrador owner!
cush 3y ago
I did this with my Aussie as well. I'd hide all of her toys throughout the house then instruct her "go get your hamburger!" and in a few minutes, she'd come back with her hamburger. It was wild that she'd remember what toy she was looking for during that time. More impressive still, was she would be able to learn new toy names through inference. I'd come home with a new toy turtle, hide all her toys, say "go get your Turtle!", and she'd come back with the new toy. And from then on she'd know which one was Turtle. She had an insatiable appetite for training and learning!
- Extropy_ 3y ago
  I have a 3 year old pug. He'll run through the house searching for the right family member if you count down from 10 and say "Go find X! Where is he?!"
  - cush 3y ago
    That's too cute! I like to imagine that you have hardwood floors in this house, and he skitters around in a frantic panic Tokyo-drifting his way to that family member
    - Extropy_ 3y ago
      WE ACTUALLY DO THOUGH!! And he does slide around. That's too funny
- q7xvh97o2pDhNrh 3y ago
  > More impressive still, was she would be able to learn new toy names through inference. I'd come home with a new toy turtle, hide all her toys, say "go get your Turtle!", and she'd come back with the new toy. Is it possible that she already knew about turtles before, though? In that case, she might just be running a rehearsed routine. You know, a shell script.
  - debo_ 3y ago
    clap
sokoloff 3y ago
We got our 3/4 poodle mix during Covid and remote work. To this day, he strongly associates me putting on jeans with "we're about to go for a walk" (which isn't entirely wrong, for sure).
- Auracle 3y ago
  I had a toy poodle growing up that would often know what I was going to do before I did. He also growled at my girlfriend for the only time around when she started cheating on me. Maybe coincidental, but it was the only time I ever recall him growling at anyone and he had known her for 2 years.
  - lebean 3y ago
    Dogs have a keen sense of smell.
jjtheblunt 3y ago
Our shetland sheepdog as kids was super smart (and funny as a consequence) in this huge vocabulary way too. Our current feral ancestry central american dog (dna tests call them village dogs, meaning not of a breeder created subset of the gene pool) is scary smart too. She’s probably got a HN account come to think of it.
actionfromafar 3y ago
I know a cocker spaniel who knows lots of such things - except tricks. Doesn't care much for tricks. But the little rascal observes and listenes keenly on everyone and everything around ...
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
strangattractor 3y ago
I can't even learn the names of 10 people I met at a party:)
bparsons 3y ago
Good dog
scott_w 3y ago
Sheepdogs are insanely bright. I have a border collie and she learns names by observation and deduction. My partner asked her where I was and she came running to me, despite never having put effort into teaching her my name. A couple of months later, a friend was at my door. I asked her “where’s Lucas?” to which she responded by looking at me and my partner before running to him. This behaviour has been observed, where a collie identified a new toy name by reasoning it was the only “new” thing so must be the thing being asked for!

sophacles 3y ago

A good friend of mine had an Aussie who was really smart. My friend was a dog trainer, and she once told me "the secret is Grace (the dog) does most of it - the puppies learn better by watching her demonstrate, and she keeps them in line". One day a mutual friend of ours died in a car wreck. I went to see my friend and we were sitting there telling stories and grieving... Grace read the room and brought my friend her favorite movie on dvd - something she watched when she was feeling blue. Grace wasn't quite sure what to do for me, but she brought me the cup I usually drank from when I was visiting. I don't know how much of that to attribute to smarts, training, and/or natural empathy, but that was an impressive dog, and its an impressive breed for sure!

bongodongobob 3y ago
I believe it. Apparently that's how herding dogs train on farms. You just buy a puppy and it literally shadows the adult. They train themselves.
- RoyalHenOil 3y ago
  I have two koolies (an Australian herding breed that is very closely related to Australian shepherds, border collies, and kelpies). I got my older dog during the lockdowns when I had a lot of free time to train him, and I got my younger dog a couple years later, when I had much less time to train her. The younger one has taught herself almost everything the older one knows, mostly by observing him, but sometimes by him actively trying to teach her. When she doesn't know something, he shows obvious signs of frustration and urging: I give a command, he does the thing I'm asking for, she doesn't react because she doesn't know the command, and then he starts growling and harumphing (and sometimes even air snaps near her face to get her attention) until she follows his lead.
- VHRanger 3y ago
  Herding is a self rewarding behavior for herding breeds. You can train herding by simply stopping the herding when he messes up (negative punishment). As long as he does it correctly he keeps doing it (positive reinforcement). For my border collie it's similar in agility. He doesn't care about treats and barely needs toys - doing the agility is the reward for learning it for him
- adishy 3y ago
  Transfer learning on (cute) biological neural nets!

spike021 3y ago

I have a Shiba Inu and he's very much the same. If I say "look there's your friend Bella!" He goes nuts because that's his favorite friend to play with. He can even recognize the sound of their owner from multiple apartment buildings away. Not kidding at all. He'll go frantic begging to go outside and as soon as we're out he'll perk his ears, figure out the direction to go, and take off. And then after five or so mins heading that way he finds his best bud.

bongodongobob 3y ago
Cool! Mine can hear my neighbors garage door open when they get home from work and goes nuts because his bestie is about to be let outside. Took me a while to figure that one out, haha. "How the hell are you predicting when the neighbors dog gets let out??"
cj 3y ago
My Shiba has learned the days of the week. I have a family member that visits every Thursday, and he sits by the door waiting for them (only on Thursdays). And god forbid I work a weekend or do something off schedule, he gets stressed out thinking something is wrong. I often joke he would be a more normal dog if he had a lobotomy. Sometimes I wish he were a bit dumber :)
- pilaf 3y ago
  That's amazing. Have you looked up whether this ability has been observed in other dogs? Do you think your Shiba is counting the days, or maybe there is something different about Thursdays (besides your family member visiting) that's giving him a hint?
  - maxerickson 3y ago
    Can maybe be something like a garbage truck.
    - cj 3y ago
      Lucky guess! I take the garbage out on Thursdays :) I doubt the dog is actually keeping track of the days. Definitely picks up cues from my own behavior based on the day/schedule, like taking the garbage out.

legohead 3y ago

I had a dumb labrador that was hard to train. Now I have a kokoni who knows 20 commands & words, and she is super easy to train. We haven't tried to test the limit of her abilities, we just ran out of things to teach her (that we cared about, at least). She never cared for toys though. I noticed while teaching her to "speak" that she would sneeze a lot, I guess it's kind of a reflex for her when she tries to speak. So I wondered, can I teach a dog to sneeze? And sure enough, after a bit of training, she will now sneeze on command.

user_7832 3y ago
> she would sneeze a lot Btw dogs often do this to indicate they're playing/mean no harm :)
- raffraffraff 3y ago
  I have had greyhounds and lurchers, and every one of them does it. It's not a full sneeze, I call it a "snit" because that's what it sounds like. They're large dogs, so when they're being playful, jumping around and play fighting, we sometimes tell them "no!" is they're about to knock something over. This always gets us a "snit". The yawn thing that someone else mentioned is also common. If they are displeased with you, you get a yawn. Like if you ask them to do something (sit, paw etc) too many times and they're bored of you, you'll get an exaggerated vocal yawn. And the last one I'll mention, because it's so common in all dogs I've seen, is the shake. Directly after a tense situation, they shake, like they do when they're drying themselves. For example, if you're walking your dog and they encounter another dog that is larger, or a breed that they don't know or don't trust, they'll sometimes do a quick shake a few seconds after the encounter. I always reward the shake with a treat, to tell them "good dog, you kept your shit together in a stressful situation". A trainer told me to do that when I had a grey who had very bad social anxiety, and it really worked.
  - precompute 3y ago
    (Human) Kids shake too! You can try it yourself, it does work.

deergomoo 3y ago

My dog occasionally forgets our house has an upstairs. He's still a good boy though.

RussianCow 3y ago
Nice to meet you, fellow labrador owner!

cush 3y ago

I did this with my Aussie as well. I'd hide all of her toys throughout the house then instruct her "go get your hamburger!" and in a few minutes, she'd come back with her hamburger. It was wild that she'd remember what toy she was looking for during that time. More impressive still, was she would be able to learn new toy names through inference. I'd come home with a new toy turtle, hide all her toys, say "go get your Turtle!", and she'd come back with the new toy. And from then on she'd know which one was Turtle. She had an insatiable appetite for training and learning!

Extropy_ 3y ago
I have a 3 year old pug. He'll run through the house searching for the right family member if you count down from 10 and say "Go find X! Where is he?!"
- cush 3y ago
  That's too cute! I like to imagine that you have hardwood floors in this house, and he skitters around in a frantic panic Tokyo-drifting his way to that family member
  - Extropy_ 3y ago
    WE ACTUALLY DO THOUGH!! And he does slide around. That's too funny
q7xvh97o2pDhNrh 3y ago
> More impressive still, was she would be able to learn new toy names through inference. I'd come home with a new toy turtle, hide all her toys, say "go get your Turtle!", and she'd come back with the new toy. Is it possible that she already knew about turtles before, though? In that case, she might just be running a rehearsed routine. You know, a shell script.
- debo_ 3y ago
  clap

sokoloff 3y ago

We got our 3/4 poodle mix during Covid and remote work. To this day, he strongly associates me putting on jeans with "we're about to go for a walk" (which isn't entirely wrong, for sure).

Auracle 3y ago
I had a toy poodle growing up that would often know what I was going to do before I did. He also growled at my girlfriend for the only time around when she started cheating on me. Maybe coincidental, but it was the only time I ever recall him growling at anyone and he had known her for 2 years.
- lebean 3y ago
  Dogs have a keen sense of smell.

jjtheblunt 3y ago

Our shetland sheepdog as kids was super smart (and funny as a consequence) in this huge vocabulary way too. Our current feral ancestry central american dog (dna tests call them village dogs, meaning not of a breeder created subset of the gene pool) is scary smart too. She’s probably got a HN account come to think of it.

actionfromafar 3y ago

I know a cocker spaniel who knows lots of such things - except tricks. Doesn't care much for tricks. But the little rascal observes and listenes keenly on everyone and everything around ...

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

strangattractor 3y ago

I can't even learn the names of 10 people I met at a party:)

bparsons 3y ago

Good dog

scott_w 3y ago

Sheepdogs are insanely bright. I have a border collie and she learns names by observation and deduction. My partner asked her where I was and she came running to me, despite never having put effort into teaching her my name. A couple of months later, a friend was at my door. I asked her “where’s Lucas?” to which she responded by looking at me and my partner before running to him. This behaviour has been observed, where a collie identified a new toy name by reasoning it was the only “new” thing so must be the thing being asked for!