Wll wErk fr Fud an LUv

 

A couple of years ago, my daughter and a friend taught our dog how to raise a paw or “shake” for a food reward. The dog is sweet and friendly, but not exactly the Einstein of the canine world, if you get my drift. However, she learned quickly because there were treats involved.

Here’s the funny thing: we noticed she was using the raised paw, unprompted, in non-food situations. It’s now a sign that means “I need . . . [fill in the blank according to the context].” So on a long car trip, she was raising her paw if she needed to get out and use the bathroom (and I think she also does that if she wants the car window cracked so she can stick her snout out). And then yesterday, my husband was petting and talking to her because she had hurt her leg, and when he stopped, she lifted her paw. Obviously, she didn’t want the session to be over.

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  1. Kay Ludlow Inactive
    Kay Ludlow
    @KayLudlow

    WillowSpring (View Comment):We added dogs sequentially, starting with the shelter dogs and the most amazing difference was their behavior towards Vultures. When we first moved out to the country, we had a vulture problem where they would sit in the trees or on the chimney. My wife would go out and yell and clap until they flew away. The first shelter dog quickly learned to run and bark at them. He was the first dog I knew that looked up. He knew the difference between Vultures (bark and go crazy) and crows, geese and so on (totally ignore) When we got the second shelter dog, he quickly learned from the first.

     

    We got a new puppy around the time that our old dog became, well, old. They overlapped for only a year or two, but it was long enough for us to witness this same phenomenon. Our old dog had a lifelong prejudice against fluffy, white dogs (she herself was a yellow lab and German Shepherd mix). She didn’t seem to care much about any other dogs, but a dog who was both fluffy and white – oh boy would she let ’em have it. Long after she passed, I recall walking our other dog and he would only lunge at – you guessed it – fluffy, white dogs. On a related note, who knew that dogs could be such bigots?

    • #31
  2. barbara lydick Inactive
    barbara lydick
    @barbaralydick

    Susan Quinn (View Comment):

    KiminWI (View Comment):
    I have a standard poodle. Pretty smart, in dog terms.

    All poodles are very smart and they know just how to wrap us around their . . . paws.

    I’ve mentioned my standard poodle several times in the past.  He was scary smart – but as I’ve said before, made me laugh at least once a day.  I really miss the Pup.  Also taught him some things using hand signals.  He was nearly 15.  Great years with him.

    If we were at the table eating, all I had to do was look at him and point to the door and he would turn around and leave the room.  No Border Collie he (in terms of herding and responding to hand signals from one hilltop to another) but there were other things he’d do on a hand signal command.

    But you’re right – those guys “know just how to wrap us around their…paws.”

     

    • #32
  3. ChefSly Inactive
    ChefSly
    @MrAmy

    Front Seat Cat (View Comment):
    Completely adorable and very smart – of course cats don’t have to bother with tricks like raising paws – they just stare at you very intently and through osmosis, you quickly get the message….

    Or, if necessary, one claw.

    • #33
  4. contrarian Inactive
    contrarian
    @Contrarian

    sawatdeeka (View Comment):
    What I think is at work here is part of the animal’s survival instinct. Dogs easily figure out or learn anything that contributes to a good dog life–food, play, affection, etc… However, if she caught sight of any of us–if we were pulling our car into the driveway or coming out onto the porch–she would get up and vociferously start running off the deer… She wanted us to think she was doing her duty.

    .

    Indeed. They’re unique in that they’re the only animal to co-evolve with humans. They transitioned from wild lupine animals to adorable obedient canines as we transitioned from hunter-gathers with our first permanent settlements (probably still competing with the occasional neanderthal) to modern humans with agriculture and trade.

    .

    We’re unique in our ability to communicate emotion with minute changes in facial expressions but they evolved to be responsive to us so well that they can pick up on nonverbal cues so subtle that we don’t notice them in one other. They seem to think of their human family as their pack mates and respond to our directions and desire our approval as they would the leaders of the pack who have social dominance and would direct coordinated hunts.

    .

    Judithann Campbell (View Comment):
    then it seemed to occur to her that if we were ok with giving the baby to my brother, then she could be ok with it too.

    .

    I think that’s another transferred pack behavior. All mammals are instinctively protective of their own young, but wolves protect all the young of their pack as if they were their own. I suppose people would look askance at the idea today, but there were times you could let your dog babysit your toddler if you weren’t going to be gone for very long. Here’s what may be a modern analog.

    .

    Kay Ludlow (View Comment):Our old dog had a lifelong prejudice against fluffy, white dogs (she herself was a yellow lab and German Shepherd mix). She didn’t seem to care much about any other dogs, but a dog who was both fluffy and white – oh boy would she let ’em have it.

    .

    Just white and fluffy, or small, white & fluffy?

     

    • #34
  5. EB Thatcher
    EB
    @EB

    My husband’s family had a dog that injured one of his front paws. While the paw was bandaged, the family babied him and didn’t scold him for transgressions.  Forever after that, whenever he did something that would bring on a scolding, he would raise the paw and give them a pitiful look. That generally made them laugh and, of course, shortened the scolding.

    • #35
  6. KiminWI Member
    KiminWI
    @KiminWI

    Kay Ludlow (View Comment):
    She didn’t seem to care much about any other dogs, but a dog who was both fluffy and white – oh boy would she let ’em have it. Long after she passed, I recall walking our other dog and he would only lunge at – you guessed it – fluffy, white dogs. On a related note, who knew that dogs could be such bigots?

    I also had a racist poodle.  He enjoyed poodles (and any other people) but always got scolding and barky with other dogs.  I talked with his breeder about it and she said he was used to other poodles in the show ring being very properly behaved. But dogs in the neighborhood would run at him and bark at him….therefore he must have concluded that only dogs of certain breeding were worthy of civility.

    And now, Clancy is ringing her bell, Excuse me.

     

     

     

    • #36
  7. KiminWI Member
    KiminWI
    @KiminWI

    So, I let her out and she immediately ran to the front door and started pawing at it, to show me a package had arrived while I was downstairs!  I guess that makes her my secretary?

     

    • #37
  8. TBA Coolidge
    TBA
    @RobtGilsdorf

    KiminWI (View Comment):
    So, I let her out and she immediately ran to the front door and started pawing at it, to show me a package had arrived while I was downstairs! I guess that makes her my secretary?

    I imagine someone of her station would more properly be called an amanuensis.

     

    • #38
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