Renne, my comments regarding being bred for look applied to show/conformation dogs. Show dogs are crap and most of them couldnt fight their way out of a wet paper bag.
As for beauty and intellect rarely being found in the same animal, have you ever listened to the acceptence speaches at a beauty pagent, I know they dont run them much these days, not PC.

We dont breed people in australia (althought I have hear that people breed with their cousins in tasmania}, apparently thier are many cases

Obviously there are many beautifull looking high IQ people out there, (I am one in fact). the point Im making is that the reason we dont see more smart dogs is because intellect is not a criteria in 95% of the dog breeding that goes on in the west. That will change as protection dog sports become more mainstream and popular.

When i was 15 i worked on a cattle station for a few months, one of the kelpies whelped, I went and played a bit withn the pups, a few days latter in went back and thier was only 2 left, 4 were gone, I asked what happened to the others. One of the guys had gotten a ring spanner and hit the rest on the head. That sort of selection is why austrlian stock dogs are exported all over the world. akennel should be judged not by how many dogs it produces but by how many are culled. If its crap it shouldnt get off the property alive.

peopel , women espescially, who cant handle that fact should stop projecting their thwarted motherhood instincts on to dogs and go and have some real kids.

I have heard it said that the higher the level of education of the people running breed associations, the lower the level of intelligence in the dogs they breed. Interesting correlation. :rolleyes: I wonder if there could be any truth to it. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

I also wonder how intelligent dogs might think humans are -- which leads me to a little story -- an absolutely true story I might add.

One of my herding dogs, Nicky, will keep my 300+ sheep where I leave them to graze for as long as I am gone. I just have to designate the boundaries for him and Nicky will keep the sheep there on his own without me. One day last summer my husband had three 17-18 year-old boys from his baseball team up to the farm to work for a few days -- 100% city boys from Brooklyn. The last day they were here I decided to give them a feel for sheepherding. I asked then to stay and watch Nicky work while I went to town. When I came back about an hour later, there was Nicky with a BIG grin <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> on his face sitting on the hillside watching the sheep just like I would have been doing if I had been there. Two of the boys came running up dripping sweat huffing & puffing and the third boy was nowhere in sight. I asked what was going on. The two boys said that they were patroling the boundaries to keep the sheep in and that the third boy was down at the barn getting water for Nicky. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> Just then the third boy came huffing & puffing up from the barn with a big pail of water which he deposited right next to Nicky who was sitting there looking like the Pope. As I looked at Nicky with his big shit-eating grin, I could have sworn he winked at me <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> . It was all I could do not to laugh out loud. In less than one hour while I was gone, Nicky had assummed the role of shepherd and taught these kids to herd sheep like a dog. The sheep were where I had left them, but Nicky had reversed roles. He had taught the boys how to do his job EXACTLY the same way I had taught Nicky years before.

I have always wondered what Nicky thought about while he sat there on the hillside during his brief reign as shepherd. Was Nicky trying to figure out whether humans think, or, whether humans are capable of problem-solving, independent thinking and making judgement calls? If he was, he probably concluded it was too early for him to tell. I'll never know for sure <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" /> since he hasn't been able to tell me in so many words. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I work for a large organization in which (typically) many of the managers seem to be the most inept employees in the agency.

Can we borrow your dog to get this situation straightened out? I promise to work with our statisticians to make sure we get a scientifically valid study of canine higher reasoning at the same time. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Pete Felknor

I am closing this threat - its going no where and anyone who is foolish enough to think that dogs don't think have not been around dogs long enough or has been smoking some goofy weed.