Now, I know that a lot of people take great pride in their dogs' intelligence, as it appears to them. Such interesting phenomenon as dogs of different breeds who live together coming up with intricate plots to open the refrigerator, the gate (which is one of the many reasons mine has a lock), stealing the food off of your plate, and all the while using tag-team effort to get away with most of these mischievous - and intelligent - actions can really take you back! At the same time, I have known many dogs who are written off by their owners as being stupid, when the true and amusing fact is that the dog is intelligent enough to convince the owner that they are dumb, and therefore, that they do not respond to training by simply pretending to be dumb by utilizing selective hearing. If you don't think a dog is capable of selective hearing, try this simple thing. If your dog behaves like he can't hear you most of the time, open up a back of potato chips as quietly as possible in another room. If the dog doesn't come, you may wish to consider BAER testing for deafness. I assure you that deafness was never the case with Xena, who's photo graces my profile.
No, Xena was another case entirely. For starters, unlike the majority of Dalmatians, she simply disliked the vast majority of human beings. On the rare occasions that she stopped a stranger to say hello (this happened with such rarity as three blue moons in a year), it always turned out that the person either happened to own multiple cats and more than one dog or else was very recently exposed to such a household. Roughly between 1:20 or even 1:40, depending on time of day and location. The rest of society was treated as if they were air.
By the time she was 9, she knew how the traffic lights operated, could respond to signals given by hand, by whisper, and in the dark. She knew how to carry kittens and how to behave in emergencies, and helped me deal with at least two shock victims by keeping them calm and nuzzling them, despite that being entirely against her personality. I never needed to teach her to check blind corners or in between buildings, and she herself decided how far apart from me she liked people to remain during daylight (five ft before an introduction, no closer than three after dark). Frankly, I eventually despaired of being able to teach her anything except possibly shapes and colours, except that she had most of those figured out already. Teaching her helped keep her... "less-than-copacetic" personality under control and much easier to live with.
Now I live with two very different dogs. One is a Native American Mountain Hound, and he is also brilliant. He writes in snow - although he scratches it out or tries to when he hears us coming - and makes his own medicine wheels on the grass with sticks HE selects and rocks HE rolls over with his nose. I tried to help him once and he destroyed the whole thing to rebuild it, so I leave it be. He loves to hear stories, most particularly about wildlife and a lot of things are understood more clearly if put in the context of what it would be like to grow up walking the Rocky Mountain trail system. It is a sad truth that he knows more languages than I do, and two of them, Russian and German, are definitely not native languages, but he knows them better than I do, I'm sure. English is the last language he learned. He's great at sign language, at being both a protection dog and assistance dog, loves to visit the hospital, and I am constantly told by people who pet him that they feel better by just stroking his fur.... I've even had the pleasure of watching a man's monitor demonstrate that his BP had lowered to acceptable limits just from five minutes of contact with him. What I can never doubt or question above all though, is that he has a very strong and very real belief in the spirit world and in Native 'Gods' --- I've been told repeatedly that's not the right word but apparently English lacks a better comparison. He follows a belief in K'nichi especially, and also in Bewasu. (For those who don't know, K'nichi is a god-like spirit that travels between planes of existence and helps protect men from 'skinwalkers', entities that kill people and assume their appearance to cause disease and disharmony. Bewasu is also known as the Thunder Bird, although I've been told that's not quite right either, but he governs the winds and rains, and doesn't particularly seem to like tall buildings.). If you laugh at either of these entities or say out loud that you don't believe a dog could believe these things, he will never come near you again.
My other dog is a little tiny thing which vaguely resembles a South American terrier/spaniel cross. She has a cleft palate and obviously her breeder loved her or she wouldn't be here. And obviously, she spent a LOT of time with someone who was not only a Spanish speaker but also prayed in Latin and was an extremely observant Catholic. Why? Because a) the dog responds very happily to her name in Latin, and b) if you even attempt a conversation about something like, say, neo-Darwinism; survival of the fittest and how that actually plays out; or make any comment which could possibly be construed as insulting regarding John Paul II, she will turn on the spot, chuff several times, then leave your presence with her tail held high. No one is ever going to convince her that God did not create the world in less than 7 days, or that Adam and Eve might be a parable for a small culture. She quite simply believes very staunchly in several very odd and conflicting ideas and will make no bones about it at all; she will defend her right to her faith to the very end if need be. Considering that all of these opinions are packed into a dog smaller than most of my cats, I find it quite amusing, but try and respect her right to her beliefs. And she knows the difference between who to avoid and who not to avoid. In general, she despises strangers -- especially if they cough or sneeze, she seems to think that's another form of blasphemy -- but knows without any shadow of doubt who it is out there that needs to be comforted, and has even allowed a very frightened man to sob into her fur because she recognized that he desperately needed some sort of outlet instead of rocking back and forth and dialing numbers only to cancel them before the call went through because he was afraid of losing not just the baby his wife was carrying, but his wife as well. It was very strange, watching a man who could not have stood without falling because he was shaking so badly being able to marshal his strength enough to go back in and support his wife, all because a tiny little dog decided to let him use her as a teddy bear that gives kisses.
I've written about this subject previously on my FB account - and no, I'm not sharing my name there until I've at least gotten an e-mail from someone - but never had any response other than people reading it. It makes me wonder though, about dog training methods and indeed, dog training in general. If a canine has this kind of cognitive ability, isn't teaching "sit" a bit below them? Ok, it is an excellent measure of how willing your canine is to work with you, but the average dog learns maybe, what, 5, maybe 8, generalized commands? No wonder they rot their brains out watching TV.... (And I'm not innocent of that one either; my dogs watch TV, and the Mountain Hound in particular has some very definite ideas about what makes a good television show. He loves Dr. Who and anything to do with quantam math, perhaps because it's not really so different from K'nichi?) Or do they ruminate about various philosophical points and discuss this with the other dogs in their lives when they rub noses?
At any rate.... Please remember that the truth is that while truly dumb dogs really do exist -- and I've met a few -- they are far out-numbered by extremely intelligent dogs who've tricked their owners into believing they can't be trained so they don't have to work. Gotta give them credit where credit is due, right?
Since these particularly intelligent dogs tend to also be extremely stubborn, training them to listen to you can be enormously frustrating. I recall that the first time that Xena, the Dalmatian, actually sat when asked to, it took her 15 full minutes to ever-so-slowly settle her rump on the ground.... and I had to train her in one of the smallest rooms in the house so I could ensure that I had her complete attention and she couldn't rope-a-dope me.
Still, there is hope. First, make sure that you have some idea of how good of a problem solver your dog really is. There are at least three different doggie IQ tests I've read and tried; I'm sure there's one suitable for you and your canine to determine whether you are dealing with a stubborn or independent dog, or one of the rare (but existing) truly dim dogs.
Once you've determined that your dog has cognitive ability that is at least normal and has problem-solving ability, then you can decide what course you want the training partnership between the two of you to be like. An excellent reference book for this is called "So Your Dog's Not Lassie: Training the Stubborn or Independent Dog." It's what helped me work with Xena when I knew NOTHING except that she was too much of a danger to not be worked with.
The book goes into greater detail, but basically, figure out what really drives your dog. Make sure you exercise your dog as best you can at whatever level the two of you are at, because a tired dog is easier to work with, while one with built-up energy has no desire to learn the basics, and without proper exercise, they tend to get more and more difficult to work with..... or live with.
So, find out if your dog is food driven. Or toy driven. Or play driven. Use their drives to direct them and reward them. And be patient. Remember, the first time the first dog I ever trained sat on command, it took over 15 minutes, and that was with exercise, play, rest, food, and sleep to put her in a good mood, with food to entice her -- and she was one of the most food-driven animals I have ever laid eyes on. And keep the training cycles short. They tend to lose focus after about 15 minutes. If possible, try and end the training on a good note --- give a command the dog CAN'T fail at, or at least, is extremely unlikely to.
The rest? Go do some reading at the library and on the Internet. Check out books that emphasize behavioural-based training with rewards instead of one of those scary things that says hitting your dog is okay. Its never okay, because you will always lose their trust and respect, and you need that respect for a lot of different reasons. Try and think of it as working in partnership with your dog rather than training, because the dog isn't dumb. He just doesn't know the words for normal behaviours! It'll also put you both in a better mood, and if the handler and dog are in a better mood, then behavioural work goes so much easier.
I try to avoid the term "training" unless I think of how Olympic athletes train, because it seems rather demeaning to me. I don't want an automaton. I love having dogs who understand words like "Excuse me please" and "thank you". I can now get my Mountain Hound to leave yappy-bappy dogs who need a much higher fence alone by saying "refocus" and then telling him what object away from the possible disaster I want him to focus on. I love not having to tell him to check blinds, even if he did need to learn that. I love that he can actually figure out what the heck I'm pointing my index finger at (the second of my dogs to be able to do this; it takes work, but can be done).
Right now we are working on things like stopping in the middle of rough play (He's over 100 lb and part wolf. Rough play sort of comes with the territory) to get him to sit or lie down. I'm working on a long down, which is doing fine, but I will admit that I have difficulty with a long down at a distance because he is so accustomed to being hip-to-hip with me because of my movement disorder, or at the very least, at my feet, most of the time. I may never be able to teach him that one.... but I have been able to get him to stay for five minutes at a distance, which gives me hope.
I just hope I don't run out of things to teach him, too!
For the record, I am not a miracle worker. I have no official training myself except from books, friends with dogs in real life and on the internet, and actually working with them. I didn't actually think it was something I needed in my life until I got Xena when I was 18, and discovered that since she was too aggressive for classroom lessons, I'd have to pay $100/visit for private lessons, and decided to take a crack at it myself. So if someone as ignorant as I was when I started can teach a dog to actually go to where the finger is pointed at and not to the finger, I think most people should be able to get through basic obedience.
