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Border collie takes record for biggest vocabulary (1022 names)
New Scientist ^ | December 22, 2010 | Jessica Griggs

Posted on 12/22/2010 6:53:43 PM PST by decimon

N THE age-old war between cats and dogs, canines might just have struck the killer blow. A border collie called Chaser has been taught the names of 1022 items - more than any other animal. She can also categorise them according to function and shape, something children learn to do around the age of 3.

Chaser follows in the footsteps of Rico, who trained at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany. Rico had a "vocabulary" of 200 words and could identify new objects in a group of familiar objects by a process of elimination, according to a study published in 2004.

To find out whether there was a limit to the number of words a border collie could learn, psychologists Alliston Reid and John Pilley of Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina, started an intensive training programme with Chaser.

Over three years, they taught the collie the names of 1022 toys by introducing them to her one by one, getting her to fetch the toy and then repeating the name to reinforce the association.

(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...


TOPICS: Pets/Animals; Science
KEYWORDS: biggest; bordercollie; chaser; collie; dog; dogs; record; roland; vocabulary
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1 posted on 12/22/2010 6:53:47 PM PST by decimon
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To: JoeSixPack

Ping


2 posted on 12/22/2010 6:54:57 PM PST by decimon
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To: Joe 6-pack

Ping


3 posted on 12/22/2010 6:59:51 PM PST by decimon
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To: decimon

Wow. Cool.


4 posted on 12/22/2010 7:00:18 PM PST by DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis (Want to make $$$? It's easy! Use FR to pimp your blog!!!)
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To: DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis

Just needed to put my B.C. down this week after 14 years. TOO smart by half. Could remember toy names you hadn’t mentioned in a year and go get ‘em. I miss my old girl.


5 posted on 12/22/2010 7:03:26 PM PST by Swanks
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To: DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis
Wow. Cool.

Learn 1020 more words and you'll match Chaser. ;-)

6 posted on 12/22/2010 7:03:39 PM PST by decimon
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To: Swanks

That’s so sad... :-(


7 posted on 12/22/2010 7:05:05 PM PST by DeoVindiceSicSemperTyrannis (Want to make $$$? It's easy! Use FR to pimp your blog!!!)
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To: decimon

That’s better than a lot of people that post on some of the discussion boards I frequent.


8 posted on 12/22/2010 7:09:12 PM PST by Past Your Eyes (I'd open it myself but I don't have any thumbs.)
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To: decimon
Border collies are indeed very smart animals. I believe they (and other dog breeds) are rapidly evolving due to their close relationship to humans.

While it won't be in our lifetime, and probably not for several hundred more years, dogs will eventually evolve to the point where they can understand our basic vocabulary, thus comprehending entire conversations and even entire books that are read to them.

I would like to be able to read "Call of the Wild" by Jack London to my dog someday.


9 posted on 12/22/2010 7:11:38 PM PST by SamAdams76
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To: decimon

When I say “squirrel”, my dog looks up into the trees and I’m amazed at that.


10 posted on 12/22/2010 7:13:17 PM PST by Past Your Eyes (I'd open it myself but I don't have any thumbs.)
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To: decimon

We have a Border Collie and a Black Lab mix breed. The Border Collie is incredibly smart. The lab on the other hand has got to be the dumbest dog I have ever owned. We still love her to death though. The Border Collie just toys with her, truly amazing to watch.


11 posted on 12/22/2010 7:14:47 PM PST by Bud Krieger (Another President, another idiot....)
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To: Bud Krieger

“The lab on the other hand has got to be the dumbest dog I have ever owned.”

Please don’t tell me his/her name is Laberal?


12 posted on 12/22/2010 7:17:34 PM PST by Attention Surplus Disorder ("Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit smoking" - Barack Hussein Obama)
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To: Swanks

I send a big hug your way. Merry Christmas.


13 posted on 12/22/2010 7:17:47 PM PST by corkoman
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To: decimon

We put one our BC’s down a couple of years ago as he was incapacitated from lymph node cancer. We have one 13-year-old BC left and will someday get BCs again. Very smart, wonderful, loyal dogs.


14 posted on 12/22/2010 7:20:22 PM PST by scripter ("You don't have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body." - C.S. Lewis)
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To: SamAdams76

If you haven’t read the Jon Katz books, you would probably enjoy them.

I ‘think’ (only a mere human, not a BC) it is in his books that he explains that BCs ability to learn is partly instinct - they want to herd and keep things, in that case animals, in their place but also because they pay very close attention to their people and what their people do, say and seem to want.


15 posted on 12/22/2010 7:24:24 PM PST by Let's Roll (Save the world's best healthcare - DEFUND Obamacare!)
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To: Past Your Eyes

When I say “deer, “fox”, “goose”, “duck”, “bunny”, etc., my Lab starts jumping around searching the horizon. Squirrels are just the everyday entertainment that she follows in the woods as they jump from tree to tree. If the squirrels are slow to climb high in the tree, she can occasionally grab ‘em.


16 posted on 12/22/2010 7:25:19 PM PST by Paladin2
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To: Swanks

I’m sorry for your loss. It’s been a couple of years since I had to do that and I still miss my boy. Puppy breath helps.


17 posted on 12/22/2010 7:31:55 PM PST by GBA (Not on our watch!)
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To: decimon

Our Australian Cattle Dog BC mix can spell or at least when we spell out w.a.l.k he’s at the door jumping around. He also knows that a round flat object is a frisbie. He knows farm, Mr. Mercat’s first name, toy, have you eaten yet (he lies though), the name of his pet dachshund, the name of the dachshund who died about two years ago, load up, out, down, come, roll over, outside, winkie, and I could go on and on. My favorite is the word “out.” If we tell him that, he leaves the room. He’s taught it to his pet dachshund.


18 posted on 12/22/2010 7:35:59 PM PST by Mercat (If he is the Come Back Kid how come his poll numbers continue to slide?)
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To: SamAdams76

“I would like to be able to read “Call of the Wild” by Jack London to my dog someday.”

Whatever you do, don’t read “To Build a Fire” to him.


19 posted on 12/22/2010 7:36:16 PM PST by Daniel II (Really??????)
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To: Bud Krieger

I think Border Collies are almost universally thought to be the most intelligent dogs.

Labs are also one of the smarter ones tho not up to the Collies.

Yours must be mixed with bulldog which really is a dumb breed. Bulldogs (not pitbulls) do make good pets tho.


20 posted on 12/22/2010 7:36:28 PM PST by yarddog
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