How Smart Is Your Dog?

Dogs and people share a special relationship. Of all the domesticated animals, it's the dog that is human's best friend. They live with us, hunt with us, work beside us and sometimes they pee behind the couch.

Canines can be smart. They can understand hundreds of words and do incredibly important work. But how smart is your dog?

Intelligence tests are available for dogs. They are found online, or animal trainers will often provide the service themselves for a fee. However, IQ tests for humans aren't really considered all that accurate because
people think in so many different ways, and measuring canine intelligence comes with it's own limitations.

Instead of trying to figure out whether a dog is smart using strange experiments set up by people that have time for that sort of thing, there are a few ways to  test dog's intelligence. Not all exercise will work for all dogs, but a good dog owner will know what her dog can and can't do without too much trouble.

The Sheet Test
Have you ever made the bed while the dog was still in it? How long it take the dog to get out from under the covers? The faster their exit, The smarter the dog - unless they get comfortable and fall asleep.

What's in a World?
Not all dogs understand commands and not all dog owners understand how to teach dogs how to respond to commands, but the canines that can sit, stay, sleep, roll over and do back flips are smarter than those that can't. Dogs that have a chip on their shoulder may, but they won't and that makes them hard to test.

Mobility's Must
Dogs are smart enough to figure out how to get around obstacles, and often that means opening doors or getting things out of spots they shouldn't necessarily fit into. Set up puzzles for the dog and see how she solves them - put a treat under something she can't fit under herself, or build a fort out of boxes and cushions and see how well she navigates them.

The Shell Game
Depending on whether you have a large or small dog, take a large or small bucket and put a treat under it.
Then put two other buckets beside the first. Now move the pup to a place where she can't see them any more and let her go get a treat. If she picks the right bucket right away, she's on the right track to admission to doggy Yale, or wherever smart dogs want to go.