Has anyone here ever had a 'dumb' Border Collie?

[Gideon's girl]

I've had 8 smart goats and one dumb one. I say the one was dumb because she was always getting her head stuck in the fence, multiple times a day. The rest of them figured out how to put their heads through and get them back out again or stopped putting them through at all. Otherwise, they are really good at finding out how to get to what they want to eat. They know they can meander over to their pen at feeding time, but if I take the dogs out, they run and get in their pen before the dogs ever get to the gate.

[geonni banner]

There's generalizing and generalizing. Sugarfoot figured out how not to get stuck behind a fence the first time she walked on one side of a fence and I walked on the other. Now if she finds a barrier of any kind between us she gives a quick glance - left, right, down and up. She takes the shortest doable route immediately.

 

Unfortunately, I am not as smart as my dog. She has a plush toy squirrel which she fetches to me by name. We encountered a real squirrel (ground squirrel) on a walk one day and I pointed and said, "Get that squirrel, Sugarfoot!" ( I hate squirrels - especially tree squirrels) She looked at the squirrel for a minute, and then back at me with an utterly dumbfounded look. You could hear her thinking, "That's not squirrel. That's alive, you stupid human!"

 

Now, I've seen her kill and eat gophers, munch, munch. But to have that varmint called "squirrel" just blew her mind. She turned from the squirrel (and me) with haughty disdain. Humbled by my dog again.

 

Sighthounds aren't stupid. They just don't give a @%*#. I saw a woman working an Afghan hound in an obedience trial once. The dog was perfect - and happy! You could have heard a pin drop in that hall. People were aewstruck. She had put a UD on that dog...

[mum24dog]

 

I have to say I've found the exact opposite. Generalizing from experience is something I think border collies excel at. That's one of the assets that makes them such great problem-solvers. Just because they can obsess over a certain place where something once happened long ago doesn't mean they're not good at generalizing.

 

I guess our experiences are different.

 

In 15 years + of helping people to understand their dogs I have found collies to be the ones to need most help to divert them from their tendency to repeat behaviours as if they are running on rails.

 

It's what selective breeding has done to them. It makes them trainable but there is a downside.

[mum24dog]

I would just like to make a distinction between a failure to generalise taught behaviours an the ability to generalise life lessons that are borne of experience ratherthan training.

 

Applying life lessons can be important for survival.

 

For example, today we were out on the salt marshes and my pup mistook a patch of long grass for solid ground, until he sank into the water beneath. A little later when he came across a similar patch elsewhere he looked carefully first and took a detour.

 

But this is the dog that has to be retaught everything in each room of the house, each section of the garden and pretty much everywhere we are likely to need it.

[Shetlander]

>>But this is the dog that has to be retaught everything in each room of the house, each section of the garden and pretty much everywhere we are likely to need it. <<

 

Retaught, retaught or simply reminded that the command still applies? Maybe I have just been lucky, but none of my dogs have needed more than one or two reps in different/distracting locations during the early stages of learning a behavior. Is that what you mean?

[CptJack]

Retaught, retaught or simply reminded that the command still applies? Maybe I have just been lucky, but none of my dogs have needed more than one or two reps in different/distracting locations during the early stages of learning a behavior. Is that what you mean?

 

This has been my experience, too - and sometimes they don't even need that, depending on the individual dog, complexity of the behavior and degree of strangeness in the environment.

 

But I don't think they've ever needed more than that once or twice to go "Oh. Yeah."

[mum24dog]

>>But this is the dog that has to be retaught everything in each room of the house, each section of the garden and pretty much everywhere we are likely to need it. <<

Retaught, retaught or simply reminded that the command still applies? Maybe I have just been lucky, but none of my dogs have needed more than one or two reps in different/distracting locations during the early stages of learning a behavior. Is that what you mean?

 

More than a couple of reminders but not as long a process as the first time.

[ncsugrad54]

I love my BC to death, but I'm not sure she is the smartest. It takes her tons of repetitions to learn a command or trick. I do trick training with her and she still doesn't understand how to run down a frisbee or how to skateboard. (and I have done training with her and watched videos on how to teach these) These are just examples. It seems to take a lot longer to teach her than some over BCs I have seen. She is very willing to please tho and is extremely sweet

[CMP]

So, I had to change up my toy storage system. The plasic baskets I used to use did not withstand the barrage of puppy abuse. So we now use an old nylon travel crate (large enough for an adult Berner) as the "toy box".

 

Yes, my dogs have a walk in toy closet. I know, I know.

 

This required training the dogs on the new "put away your toys" protocol. It gave me a great anecdotal story to relate when someone says "So, are Border Collies really smarter than other dogs?".

 

I have the three youngest dogs - 6 month old BC Molly, 1.5 year old Scottie Snap and 2 year old Berner Mina all in my impromptu training class.

 

The best way to teach them seems to be to get them to go inside the crate, drop the toy and go back out for the next one. Our system involves coming to a specified spot to pick up a treat after each toy is put away. So, the deal is I set the dogs to putting away the toys and the dog who puts the most away gets the most treats.

 

The Berner, until the day she dies, will take every toy into the box, drop it carefully, come back out and get her treat. The Scottie will go much faster, the drop will be made, flyball style, while he is in transition from in to out - and he will do that all the rest of his life.

 

The BC puppy discovered that (a) you can throw them in from outside and if you have a lot of momentum they whack the end of the crate and you can get the treat and next toy faster. So, she's got five thrown in while the Berner is carefully depositing the first one and the Scottie is on his second and ( that if you hide toys under the couch you can get them when everything else is done, put them in and get even more treats.

 

BC puppy has also discovered that any time you put a toy away, you get a treat. Which will have to be changed as she now goes and gets toys out, just so she can come and get me to give treats while she puts them back in.

[Lizabeth]

Yes! That is what I have been thinking about teaching these 2 in my house the heeler and bc! Thanks CMP! My daughter rolls her eyes every time I say we need a basket so I can teach these dogs to put their toys away saying it is impossible! I am gonna do it!! First to get a basket!

 

And about the question asked... Forgive me my dear sweet Poppy Corn... I have not met a stupid BC But I have met and have been living with the stupidest sweetest beagle that I have ever seen in my entire life for the past going on 15 years! With that said, she is sweet, well behaved, I can take her anywhere, walk her around show her her boundary area she will never cross that line. Great dog, awesome with kids never a problem with her, food motivated to a fault. Dumber then a box of rocks. But I love that old girl!

[KaliFreya]

I remeber this story from the Susan Clothier's book Bones would rain from the sky (highly recommend btw).. there was an experiment where two different teachers got two different classes of average students. One teacher was told their class is "the slow" one, the other that they got the above average, high potential kids. After a while they analysed the result and guess what - the teacher with the "bright" kids worked harder and pushed harder, and the kids got better results. The "slow" ones believed there was surely a limit to how much these kids could learn, and their results were average or below average.
The same goes for dogs. I've had people ask me how did I teach my mutt so many tricks, she is surely some little genius, while they couldn't teach their dog to sit, let alone sit pretty/beg. I asked what methods of training have they tried, and most of the times the answers was "we didn't really try after we realized he doesn't just do it" or "tried pushing his butt down and he didn't want to sit". While teaching tricks and general while training most people don't understand that what you reinforce is what you get. Not what you think you reinforce. Yes, maybe this one time dog sat down and you gave him a treat, but the other time maybe you said "please sit pretty honey" or "would you sit for me pretty please" or you made a different hand gesture etc. You have to be clear, precise and have very good timing.
Now some dogs are not that fast in executing their learned behaviour, and that's ok. It's not about the intelligence, it's about their drive and energy in general. I wouldn't say they're dumb just because of that.

[jen2]

03 Nov

by all means yes, and I think I have one of the dummie BC--male of couse and chocolate brown...they are supposed to be smart but think this one got left out.  He has the intelligence of a knat!!  And that is also his attention span...have had two collies and this one is the dumbest by far...females are better...which this one was supposed to be, but someone wanted male!!