Most Intelligent Breed?

[RealityBites]

I of course am very biased twowards the dobes as well, my older male would definately send me in first in the matter of security, unless it was something that looked like fun! He went straight through a glass window a few weeks ago to get to me when I was at my parents. I'm not sure it that's stupid or smart but he leant against it several times first, then just backed up, did a runner with his head down and came straight through the glass! Leapt through it as it was breaking around him and came over to me tail wagging, saying 'Did you SEE that?? THAT was awesome!!!!'

The pup became impossible to play chasey with at a young age as he would end up laying in wait for you instead of chasing. He'd figure out which way you were going to go and cut ahead of you to wait. Then there was the time he was chasing me round and round the coffee table, stopped and leapt straight over it to get to me. Definately a very intelligent breed. Not the most trainable (Intelligence and trainabilty do NOT mean the same thing!) but they are definately smart.

[samoyedman]

Consider this; is a dog who mindlessly obeys its master time after time after time without question and becomes like a robot more "intelligent" than a dog who does a command 2 or 3 times then says to itself "hmm whats in this for me? I'm not going to do this anymore." :-)

Have a think about that.

[ILuvAmstaffs]

Definately have to say ease of training is probably way different to intelligence. My Amstaff, Diesel, is a dream to teach, learns very quickly & will do as asked almost everytime. On the other hand, Max the dobe is the most pig headed you know what ever. Used to cringe when taking him to training, he learns quick but its very much a case of, I will do it once or twice, but after that, you can do it yourself!

[Sayreovi]

Consider this; is a dog who mindlessly obeys its master time after time after time without question and becomes like a robot more "intelligent" than a dog who does a command 2 or 3 times then says to itself "hmm whats in this for me? I'm not going to do this anymore." :-)

Have a think about that.

Wouldnt that depend on the dog and the training it has recieved?

For the first example say the training method wasnt exactly positive wouldnt the dog be intelligent to learn to avoid behaviours that would recieve punishment? Or maybe the dog understands that their owner is extremely happy when they follow commands and then the dog gets a reward that it wants?

The second dog is intelligent but not smart lol, wouldnt a intelligent dog do what the owner requires and gets a reward the dog wants then to not do it and get punished?

If the dog is not doing it after a few times, maybe the motiviation is gone and you need to do something new to make the dog want to do it.

[Rom]

The issue I have with canine intelligence tests is that a lot of the exercises in the tests use food. I.e., find which cup the food is hidden under in a timed exercise. My ridgeback, who is a highly food motivated hoover hound would have that food before you started the stop watch, where as my friends Sibe, would look at you as if to say, 'Yeah, I know where it is, that doesn't necessarily mean I want it or that I'm going to put in any effort to go and get it.' So I figure that results of the test may not be entirely accurate if you are comparing a highly food motivated dog with one that isn't.

One of the other exercises I've read about is putting a towel or blanket over your dogs head and timing how long it takes to find its way out or get the blanket off its head. My dog loves to be under blankets...there is a good chance she'd settle down for a snooze and it'd be a good hour before she got out from under there....I figure that results of this test would be influenced by how comfortable a dog felt about having its head covered.

JMHO, but I don't think that either exercises really proves intelligence one way or another.

[lab and poodle]

Look I think the tests are perfectly fine well balanced scientific foolproof tests as it makes both of mine look like einsteins and they are the two best dogs in the world . I am not breed , owner blind , or searching for a particular set of skills either.

[Rom]