-Submitted by David Drumm (Nal), Guest Blogger
Laddy, a border collie, had been missing for several days when some whimpering caused a neighbor to, counterintuitively, look up. After being rescued, Laddy was returned to his owners servants. Chasing squirrels is suspected.
H/T: Quad-City TImes.
I enjoyed this story. I really needed a happy ending! Sometimes stuff really gets to me….we have so much potential as humans and seem to fail miserably. This Collie probably needs a job. I have a German Shepard named Sydney she really needs to work. She is my joy, I love her so.
Okay Nal … that’s just silly
James Thurber in his book “Thurbers Dogs” talks of one of his dogs who used to drive all the neighbourhood dogs mad by walking along the top rails of fences.
new breed of bird dog?
Border Collies are supposed to be the most intelligent breed followed by German Shepherds in second place. There is a border collie in Europe, Germany IIRC with a 300 word vocabulary of words understood and who is able to understand pictures, show it a drawing of one of its toys and it will go and fetch that toy. Unfortunately I have not found the youtube entry on which I saw it.
There is another border collie in the US who understands 1000 words and has an understanding of sentence structure and parts of speech. It can understand instructions such as “pick up toy 1 and put it next to toy 2. Of course it has undergone a lot of training by its master a retired experimental psychologist.
My own dog Rexx is a German Shepherd cross and I never cease being amazed by her understanding and ability to make herself understood. She likes dry cat food as a treat and when she wants some sits down by the cupboard where we once stored the dry cat food and stares at me.
Farely Mowat, the Canadian naturalist who studied wolves, in his book “Never Cry Wolf” alleged that the Inuit claimed that the howling of wolves was a language and that they could extract information from it, for example where the caribou herd is to be found or that there is a canoe with a specified number of people coming up the river.
Wolves and humans are both social animals so it does not surprise me that dogs have the capacity for language but since they are mostly confined one or a few at a time do not have the chance to develop it.
I am stunned the police volunteered to even return the dog. Nice to see that some still serve the community instead of their ego.
Border collies are great dogs–smart and very intuitive as well. I think Laddy knew he looked silly stuck up in a tree, so that’s why he has that embarrassed look in the photo.
Nal, Good one Lol. You knew I would like the ambiance too…
This guy climbs like a boss, ‘fetch’ in three dimensions:
Get down …
Nal, that is the ugliest kitteh you have ever posted. If you’re going to find kittehs in odd place to post at least find cute kittehs!
😉
(I’m glad he was found.)
This behavior by the pooch, a placental mammal like us (and cats too) could be viral induced behavior.
Until an asteroid and a virus helped placental mammals dominate we were doomed not to exist –because the dinosaurs were supreme.
We still are not sure when the first mammals originated, but it seems sure they were not placental.
I know what happened . . . ovine aviation.
Plenty of lost sheep in Davenport, IA, but back to the story.
A great pic and I’m happy that he found his way back to his fam.
Wonder if there’s a lost sheep in Davenport right now??
Great picture. That puppy is lucky someone heard him. I have seen a dog or two start up a tree, but this guy made it up pretty far.
Glad the pooch was found and is ok.
Border collies are great dogs but they are incorrigible car chasers, trying to herd those damn Mustangs! So, they are @ risk if not prevented from access to the road.
I found the collie….didn’t see a squirrel or a kitteh…
Yes it’s possible that a big dog could climb a tree…