Animal Intelligence

By far my favorite aspect of animal intelligence are the stories of interspecies friendships. A goat that hangs out with tiger cubs? A pig that befriends a bear? A moose and a tern who are inseparable? These sorts of things make my day. I want to believe that on some level, all animals are capable [...]

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Here’s one a couple months old. The 20 January 2008 edition of the Toronto Star reported on two new stuides about the brains of squirrels.
First, from the journal Animal Behaviour (which sounds like something I need to be reading!), biologist Michael Steele at Wilkes University in Pennsylvania has been examining how squirrels cache nuts. Apparently, [...]

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In an older post about elephants in love, Lynne shared the following story. With her permission, I’m posting it as an entry.
I volunteered at a zoo back in the 1970’s doing animal behavior observations with elephants and others.  I spent one hour each week observing and recording what I saw.
One week I watched the herd [...]

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“You’re home blogging full-time now,” a friend wrote me recently. “Does that mean there’s a chance you’ll revive Animal Intelligence? Again?” Why sure!
A couple of people sent me this BBC News story about a New Zealand dolphin that helped to rescue a pair of beached whales. Due to copyright issues, I’ve been trying not to [...]

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People keep sending me animal intelligence links, but I haven’t found the time to post them. Instead, here I am on a Saturday morning posting a video of a cat in a bathtub.

Have you ever seen such behavior? Most of my cats hate water. I have one, Max, who will drink from the faucet, and [...]

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In August, the Guardian Unlimited reported on an elephant love story. It’s a short piece, so I’ll quote it in its entirety:

It’s a very traditional love story — just on a bigger scale than usual. A tame female elephant has fled an Indian circus after eloping with a wild bull elephant that broke open a [...]

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After yesterday’s story about drunken elephants, an Animal Intelligence reader pointed me to this video clip from the 1974 documentary Animals Are Beautiful People. In this scene, a variety of animals get a little tipsy from consuming fermented marula fruit.

According to the Wikipedia entry on this film, some critics believe this scene was staged. It’s [...]

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I’ve read many reports of animals who love alcohol just as much as humans do. But until now, I never knew that their wild parties could lead to drunken brawls. The West Australian has a story about a herd of elephants that had a little too much beer and then went on a rampage. Here’s [...]

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Animals are often credited with possessing an uncanny sixth sense, a level of perception beyond those that we as humans possess. Some people believe that animals are able to sense barometric changes and can be used as an indicator of impending rain. (I never believed this until recently when we were hit with an unexpected [...]

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Nicole forwarded an amazing video. Christian the lion was raised by humans and then released into the wild. Watch the cat’s reaction when these people return to see him a year later.

After a year apart, after a year in the wild, Christian still recognizes his old friends and greets them with enthusiasm. Aside from [...]

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I’m back from vacation and eager to write more about animal intelligence. While I was gone, a couple of readers (this site has readers!) forwarded stories about amazing animals. I’ll share those in the coming days.
For now — and seemingly at random, I know — here are several clips of chickens who live with cats. [...]

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My friend Dave pointed me to a brief story at NPR’s “Morning Edition”. Here it is in full:
If you’re an elephant turned bandit, you don’t need a gun; a couple of pointy tusks will do. The Hindustan Times reports an elephant bandit is holding up motorists in the eastern state of Orissa. His modis operandi [...]

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On strong recommendations from friends, my wife and I have been watching Planet Earth, the BBC nature documentary recently broadcast on The Discovery Channel. The cinematography is gorgeous, and I love the insights into animal behavior.
I can’t give the project unequivocal praise, though. The writing is sometimes uneven, and some episodes lack any real [...]

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Kruger National Park is the largest game reserve in South Africa. It lies nestled in the northeast corner of the country, next to Mozambique and close to Zimbabwe. The reserve is home to a variety of flora and fauna.
YouTube user Jason275 has posted footage captured by a group on safari inside the park. Beside a [...]

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Here’s another in a long line of videos where I’m unsure what I’m seeing. The person who posted this at YouTube wrote, “A tortoise in our garden defends it’s territory against invading cats.”

Is the tortoise playing? Is it angry? (I lean toward the latter.) Are the cats hurting it when they respond? It doesn’t look [...]

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Lynn forwarded a story from Fox News about bats who have learned how to sober up when they become intoxicated.

Bats often risk getting drunk off cocktails of alcohol that stew inside ripened fruit. And just as driving is dangerous for intoxicated humans, so is flying for drunken bats.
Now scientists find bats are savvy enough to [...]

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Amanda sent a story of a cat who rides the bus. According to the London Daily Mail, a mystery cat has been hitching a ride for the past few weeks.

The feline, which has a purple collar, gets onto the busy Walsall to Wolverhampton bus at the same stop most mornings — he then jumps off [...]

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Fox News, of all places, is reporting that officials at a zoo in northern Thailand are hoping that “panda porn” will encourage animals in their possession to mate.

Chuang Chuang the panda has been spending his days in front of a big screen television watching panda porn. Authorities at the Chiang Mai Zoo in northern Thailand [...]

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Canaduck forward a story about a dog that saved its owner from choking:

Toby, a 2-year-old golden retriever, saw his owner choking on a piece of fruit and began jumping up and down on the woman’s chest. The dog’s owner believes the dog was trying to perform the Heimlich maneuver and saved her life.
Debbie Parkhurst, 45, [...]

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Here’s an awesome article from New Scientist, and some video to go along with it.

In a revelation that destroys yet another cherished notion of human uniqueness, wild chimpanzees have been seen living in caves and hunting bushbabies with spears. It is the first time an animal has been seen using a tool to hunt a [...]

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Science News reports that researchers at the University of Cambridge have discovered that some birds have a concept of time that includes the future, and that they’re able to plan their meals accordingly.

The strongest evidence yet that animals plan ahead may come from western scrub jays preparing for their morning meals.
Plenty of animals perform actions [...]

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I had an interesting conversation with my friend Paul last week. We were discussing socially-responsible investing via chat. The conversation eventually turned more philosophical:

5:27:50 PM radiofreewog: I can’t let my ego control my behavior
5:28:05 PM jdroth: ?
5:28:07 PM jdroth: Ego is all there is.
5:28:13 PM jdroth:
5:28:27 PM radiofreewog: hmmm
5:28:42 PM radiofreewog: getting beyond ego [...]

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This doesn’t show intelligence per se, but it is certainly curious behavior. Here’s Nora, the piano-playing cat:

What prompts animals to do things like this? I cannot believe it’s simply random. It’s certainly not instinctual. (I have friends who believe that all animal behavior is purely instinctive — a position I believe is completely indefensible if [...]

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allAfrica.com has a story about how chimpanzees use the same plants as traditional human healers to treat physical ailments.

In her five-year study at Kanyawara research station, located on the edge of Kibale, [Sabrina] Krief found that chimps carefully select and consume plants like mululuza, which have little nutritive value. These plants, however, have medical properties [...]

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