So … is your pet smart? Take the quiz!
By Gina Spadafori
July 27, 2007
Dr. Becker and I wrote a pair of quizzes for Parade.com (Christie helped, too) that tests the intelligence of your dog or cat. Take the tests, and then come back and tell us your scores.
The test isn’t “scientific,” but is based on all the science we’ve sucked up over the years (and that’s a lot of years and a lot of science), plus our own experiences with a lot of dogs and cats. We worked really hard to make it more about innate reasoning ability, not just the ability to learn new things quickly, because people do get tired of border collies always making it to the top of the class. (OK, border collie people don’t, but the rest of us do!)
But mostly, we did it for fun. Because we all love to find out more about our pets, and brag on them, too.
Don’t feel too bad if your pet doesn’t hit the top ranks on the test. Your pet’s plenty smart, no matter what. As we point out, your pet found you, right? How dumb can he be?
And when you’re done, check your own knowledge of pets with a pair of quizzes we put together last year, for the launch of our first two books together, “Why Do Dogs Drink Out of the Toilet” (a New York Times best-seller) and “Why Do Cats Always Land on Their Feet?” The third in the series, “Why Do Horses Sleep Standing Up?,” comes out in the fall. (You can order them all in our bookstore, and more.)
The quizzes on your own pet IQ:
90 points for my female cat, 84 for my male. And yes, they are smarter than me.
Comment by Andrea 2CatMom — July 27, 2007 @ 7:18 am
My 11+ old girl is a 72. Will do the other four at another time.
Comment by catmom5 — July 27, 2007 @ 7:23 am
My female Manx scored a 90, but two of the questions weren’t really fair because a) we don’t use a can opener to open cat food and b) she doesn’t really have a tail. Talk about a culturally biased IQ test! :) She’s the smartest cat I’ve ever seen, bar none. I’m sure my other 3 ladies will score somewhat less.
Comment by Debra — July 27, 2007 @ 8:44 am
Debra - we don’t use a can opener either, so I substituted opening the refrigerator instead.
Comment by Andrea 2CatMom — July 27, 2007 @ 8:56 am
86 for Pepper (dog — I’m very disappointed — she’s a Border Collie! She should have gotten 100% ;-()
84 for Lindsey (cat — he’s pretty laid back — Dinara, Queen of the Universe would have gotten 100, Scherazade would have gotten a 40 — she let Dinara do all her thinking for her [that falling off the window ledge when sleeping and then going right back was classic for her!])
I got a 80% on cats (yes, had more cats in my life than dogs) and a 60% on dogs. Don’t tell the dog park folks (I’m the past President) about my lousy dog score! ;-)
Comment by Dorene — July 27, 2007 @ 9:11 am
My 2+ year old rescue aby who has only been with me for a few months scored an 82. I don’t use a can opener for cat food, but if there is any activity in the kitchen she is there to check it out.
Comment by Moira — July 27, 2007 @ 9:13 am
I have no idea what a “weekend” is and thus, neither do my dogs. ;)
Comment by Christie Keith — July 27, 2007 @ 9:42 am
Zoey got a 92 and Diesel got a 60.
Comment by Great Dane Addict — July 27, 2007 @ 10:21 am
We have always had cats in pairs, and there is always one trouble maker, usually the smarter one, and one that sits aside and egg the other on while acting as a lookout…
Our Pet Food Patient gets 90. Plus she invented Fetch, realizing that we would throw the toy again if she brought it all the way back to us…
I’ll give our now long gone cancer cat 90, plus she would chase the sun reflected off my watch, or a laser pointer. But when the laser vanished into a light switch on the wall she would go around the corner to wait for it to come out the other side… ;)
Comment by steve a — July 27, 2007 @ 11:38 am
94. Feline-stein! Fear my brilliant kitty! She lost points for being a little clumsy. I rated the alpha female, because she’s the smartest of the six, but even the least brilliant got a 90.
One of my previous alpha males would do a “Come quick, Timmy!” dance to show us an empty water dish, and then wait for the other cats to drink their fill first. He was a very responsible boy. The alpha female at that time, Persephone, was a problem-solving genius. There was no place in the house where food she wanted was safe, except the fridge or the microwave. I kept waiting for her to figure out how to operate the microwave door latch.
Comment by Katherine — July 27, 2007 @ 11:42 am
Oh, and I only scored 80% at the University of Meow. Alas!
Comment by Katherine — July 27, 2007 @ 11:45 am
Oh, also? I think that multiple cats who interact with other smart cats end up smarter. I have six, and they’re all very smart.
Comment by Katherine — July 27, 2007 @ 11:46 am
One more, just because.
One of our other late lamented kitties had a heart condition, which we didn’t realize until she died. :( We were playing with one of those “cat fishing poles”—toy on a string. She watched the other cats play for awhile. You could see the eyes—toy, string, pole, string—and the little gears turning in her head. Then she grabbed the string and used it to take the toy from her sister! :)
Comment by Katherine — July 27, 2007 @ 11:49 am
My golden got a 90! she’s pretty smart about how to get me to do her bidding! Me, I only got 60% at the University of Woof.
Katie
PS Thanks Gina, that was fun!
Comment by Katie — July 27, 2007 @ 12:20 pm
My Trooper (Dog-Standard Schnauzer) had 85 points without the bonus round. I stopped counting that when we got over 100.
He is a great dog, one of the smartest creatures I know. But I think that as a pet he’d be a bad choice for most people. A dog that can and does open any door he thinks needs open, a dog who fears nothing is a handfull. Thank Dog he doesn’t have thumbs and is too short to see over the steering wheel and reach the gas…
When I’m talking to people who tell me they are looking for a smart dog, I always try to find out if they mean a smart dog or a trainable dog. Two very different things.
My friend has a border collie who is both. He’s quite a handfull too. Her lab, bless her, is trainable, but not very smart dhr will spend hours sitting in a room with a door slightly ajar, unable?(unwilling??) to push it open wide enough to go through (a good choice for novice dog owners)
My Ace who was neither easily trainable nor smart was far and away the “best” sort of dog for a Joe Public dog owner.(And the most loving dog to walk the earth) He never got out of a pen you put him in, because it never dawned on him he could, he never got into things that were “out of reach” ditto. He didn’t fret about scary things like visits to the vet. Just thrilled to get to go. Once he learned something, which to a lot of reps, he had it. But it was not quick. He was loving and sweet, my little “Down’s syndrom” doggie. I enjoyed your quiz, don’t get me wrong, but… I’d really love to see more information about the joys of sharing your life with a Forest Gump kinda guy.
Comment by Schnauzer — July 27, 2007 @ 12:24 pm
My cat scored 93. She doesn’t know how to turn on the faucet yet, though I’ve tried to teach her.
Comment by Joel — July 27, 2007 @ 4:45 pm
100 for my oldest lab. Haven’t done the younger one yet.
I swear I’m not making up his score. I’ve always felt my older lab was way smarter than most creatures, human or otherwise.
It can be a tad scary at times. ;-)
Comment by ally — July 27, 2007 @ 5:08 pm
Finally, did the Meow quiz. I got a 73% I told you my cats were smarter.
Comment by Andrea 2CatMom — July 27, 2007 @ 6:21 pm
Bailey got a 90, doing the treat-based questions right after breakfast. But some of the questions were confusing: You can tickle dogs’ ears?
She has an ugly ear infection right now, or else I’d try it.
Comment by KathyF — July 28, 2007 @ 1:15 am
All our flatcoats (three of them) got an 88. I didn’t test our golden, he’s only five months old at the moment a finds sitting while waiting for his meal challenging…
Comment by ramin — July 28, 2007 @ 8:45 am
What fun!
Puck (my 3 year old boxer/terrier mix, looks like sort of a smallish faux brindle wolfhound) got 94 with 2 bonus points
Bean (my sister’s 14 month old westie) got 78 and 3 bonus points
Hekmatollah (my 3 year old cat from Baghdad, short hair but NOT domestic) got 88
Mouse (my 2 year old domestic gray long hair who has the dumb blond wide-eyed look down pat) got 80
I got 100 on canine and 120 on feline because my brain is a magpie nest full of odd stuff
Hekmatollah only turns on the water in the bathroom if I put my clean clothes on the sink while I’m taking a shower.
Schnauzer - I had a cat, Beauford (we found him abandoned in McKinley Park, Sacramento, the same place we found one dog and two other cats that we adopted) who didn’t have enough brains to fill a thimble, but he was the sweetest cat ever. He loved all dogs, cats and people. He used to sleep in the street gutter and the sprinkler runoff water would back up behind him and he wouldn’t even notice. The dogs would drag him across the hardwood floor by his tail and he thought it was fun. He would hang with your fingers under his armpits and let you spin him in circles (head-over-tail) completely relaxed thinking it was great. He died many years ago and I miss him still. He would have scored the minimum possible on the cat quiz, but Hekmatollah (who scored quite highly) would often rather disembowel me than cuddle. Since Hek was feral and spent his infancy in Baghdad dumpsters being bombed and shot at, I don’t blame him at all. Hek likes me and Beauford loved me. I loved Beuford, and admire Hek. Brains have nothing to do with love in either direction.
Comment by Carol PW — July 28, 2007 @ 6:44 pm