What's With This?

[corvus]

Normally when we take Kivi and Erik to the park in the morning they get their breakfast soon after we get home. However, recently a few times OH left for work from the dog park, so made up their breakfast beforehand and left it on the kitchen counter for me to give them when we got back. EVERY time this has occurred, Erik has started whining in excitement as the car pulls into our driveway. When I let him out of the car he runs to the door and scrapes on it with his paw, whining if I'm not fast enough letting him in. Then he runs to the kitchen counter and looks up and then looks back at me.

Can he really remember that 40 minutes ago his breakfast was prepared and left on the kitchen counter? Does he know it's still there, or is he responding to a heightened anticipation of breakfast that may occur because he has already seen and smelt it being prepared? I don't think he's had a chance to learn the association that coming home from the park = immediate breakfast. He didn't seem to need to learn it. It has happened a few times and he is starting to show a generalised, slightly-more-excited-than-usual response to coming home from the park in the morning, particularly when OH is not with us, but when his breakfast is on the kitchen counter waiting for him it's much stronger. He doesn't show any sign of being concerned about leaving the house while his breakfast is on the counter, and he is his usual self at the park. The only difference is when we pull in back home. I have tried to do some training with him before going inside and he wants none of it. He went and stood in front of the front door at every opportunity. What is going on, here? How can he possibly remember/know that breakfast is waiting for him?

[Fatsofatsoman]

I believe their memory is quite good.

If my sister's dog comes over and stays the night Boonie will know the next morning she is on the deck (he is separated in another room). She can be sound asleep - we'll take the the baby gate down (she's not in his line of sight or making a noise) and he'll run straight to the deck. The day after when she isn't staying he wont bother at all.

Also if I have a mate staying over (who Boonie absolutely adores - and my mate adores Boon back) the same thing - he'll run straight to the spare room, which is ages away from his and wake my mate up with excited licks. Next night doesn't bother.

To me this I think is more down to memory than smell - so I believe Erik can remember the food is there. The fact that it only happens on the random days that you do it I reckon proves this.

And I mean if they (Boonie) can remember straight away when asked to get a certain toy that he's hidden (different spots each time) and he goes straight to where it is and brings it also to me points to memory.

[Bubitty]

I also think they have a good memory.

I often buy Bubby yum cha as take away but sometimes I don't give him all of it. Everytime he has yum cha and sees me put the box in the fridge, later on he will take me to the fridge and look at me expectantly.

I often try to offer him other things to throw him off but he will keep urging me until I give him his remaining yum cha! When there is no yum cha he doesn't ever walk me to the fridge.

[Are You Serious Jo]

Dogs don't have episodic memory, they don't have the cognitive prerequisites to enable them to do so.

[W Sibs]

Charlie has a really good memory. I once put his favourite toy away for some reason. I totally forgot about the toy. A few days later, he was sitting at the cupboard barking at it. When I opened it the cupboard, he was getting more excited and started to his do his excited bouncing and when I got his toy...

Emmy is forgetful. She tends to forget where she hides things. If it's really important to her, she goes check the object every 30 seconds just in case she forgot where she hid it. She will hides her pig ear in clear view that everyone can see it, and still forget where she hid it... then gets upset, then I'll be like 'Get your ear' and then she will find it because I point it out to here where it is. When she was a pup, I had to constantly remind her to finish her dinner because she gets distracted to easily and forgets. She is a funny little thing.

Edited April 14, 2011 by CW EW

[Bjelkier]

Dante did a similar thing when I was soaking his kibble.

He would see me make it up and then we went and did something else, he would continue to return to the kitchen looking at the spot his food was (not that he could actually see it)

[Leelaa17]

Dogs don't have episodic memory, they don't have the cognitive prerequisites to enable them to do so.

lol english? Sorry i can be quite dense sometimes - what is episodic memory?

[corvus]

Episodic memory is kind of like reliving something that happened once. The where, when, what and everything else linked to it. It's pretty much impossible to test for in animals because technically the animal has to be consciously recalling the memory and we don't know how to tell if an animal is doing that. There are some caching birds that selectively recover perishable items they have hidden over non-perishable depending on how much time has passed since they hid them, suggesting that they remember what they hid, where they put it, and how long it's been there. That's scrub jays, though. Jays break all sorts of animal cognition rules. I just threw it in there 'cause I'm a headliner.

[Aidan3]

I'd be looking at the discriminative stimuli, of which there are probably several.

They seem to be very good at remembering places that are important to survival. We go hiking a lot, and there is this one tree, unremarkable but for the fact that my dogs once (4 or 5 years ago) treed a possum there. Of all the trees in the bush, this is the one they seek out, then look up expectantly at, every single time.

[corvus]

Assuming this is long-term memory of some sort, what triggers its recall? What makes him remember that his breakfast is waiting for him? When my long-term memory is triggered, normally either I am trying to recall something that is relevant to the moment, or the memory returned unbidden due to some sight or smell or collection of stimuli that reminds me of a former experience. Memories don't just pop into my head without some kind of prompting. Given we don't follow this routine every day, it can't be just where he is and that it's morning after our trip to the dog park. Or that he's anticipating something he can reliably predict. I thought maybe he was responding to the absence of OH, who normally gets him out of the car while I get Kivi out, but he starts whining before the car stops moving.

My mum's dog used to think I could produce wildlife out of thin air because I appeared to do so a couple of times. It fascinated me that we could be walking along and all of a sudden out of the blue he would become utterly convinced that I had a bird somewhere. He would duck behind me, check anything I was carrying, want to look into my hands, and even if he couldn't find anything he would prance next to me with his ears up and forward, the picture of anticipation. I never did figure out what would trigger this, but perhaps he would smell birds and that got him going?

ETA One of our dog park friends has a dog that is similarly obsessed with a single tree in the park. I think the story goes one day she saw a possum or a duck in it and every single day since she has stood underneath it and peered up into the branches wagging her tail excitedly. She goes back and forth to make sure she has viewed the holy spot from every angle and then gives up and leaves it.

Edited April 14, 2011 by corvus

[kiesha09]

I think they remember. If my dog can bury her bone and remember which pot plant she put it in 3 days later then I definately think they can remember their food being prepared 40 mins earlier.

[corvus]

And some days OH doesn't come home with us and I make his breakfast, so it's not waiting for him when we get back. I do think he is slightly more excited when we get home on those days than when OH does come home with us, but it's still nothing compared to when OH doesn't come home with us and Erik's breakfast is waiting. And one time OH made his breakfast up and then came home with us afterwards anyway and he was very excited again. But not quite as excited as when OH isn't there and his breakfast is waiting. I'm more inclined to think the OH absence is a secondary clue for him. There must be something else. I thought maybe he could smell it through the closed up car and the closed up house, but I'm not entirely convinced about that one. He starts whining and jumping about just before we pull into the driveway, usually, but sometimes starts much earlier.

[megan_]

More long-term than short term, but when Fergus was a pup (about 8 months), I was doing some training with him and it got dark. We were all alone - or so I thought. I was bending over giving him a tummy rub for a job well down when suddenly I heard a voice behind me. I got a huge fright, jumped up and stepped back. Fergus obviously read my reaction and went off (which is completely uncharactaristic). When I gained my composure, I realised that it was a guy who was often at the park. He has a slight mental disability and speaks with an impediment.

I calmed Fergus down and we left.

For well over a year we didn't see that man and went to the park almost daily. Then one day, whilst at the park, Fergus went ballistic. This was completely out of character. I turned him around and walked him to the car - there were lots of kids around so my main consideration was getting him out of their ASAP. Out of the corner of my eye I spotted the man who had frightened us over a year ago. As soon as we were away from him, he was calm again.

And now for my short term example, but this may just be ordinary stuff? We went to the beach a few months ago, and I accidentally threw his ball into some thick bushes. He circled them, tried to plot a way in etc but couldn't get the ball. We went for our walk and I had another ball with me. We were gone for about an hour. When we were walking back to the exit, he suddenly took off. He went back to the bushes and dived in. The bushes shook for a while and he emerged triumphant.

ETA: Whenever we pull up to KCC, there is much crying and excitement. We do lure coursing there - but only once or twice a year.

Edited April 14, 2011 by megan_

[jacqui835]

As my dog got older, his memory improved. In the beginning, although he quickly learned the names of his toys, he would just look randomly around on the floor if you asked him to get the toy, and he hadn't played with it for more than like 15 mins. But these days, if I say, go get toy x, he runs off to wherever he saw it last, and this seems to work even if we haven't played with toy x for a week or so etc. His memory is quite good these days, and consequently, we don't lose nearly as many toys lol.

He also has an exceptional memory for people. I haven't seen him forget anyone yet, and these can be people he only met briefly as a very young puppy. This is a dog who is quite aloof around strangers, so it's a very noticeable thing, and always makes people feel very special lol.