My Dog Is A Genius

My dog is a genius. You are just going to have to take my word for it since I don't have an operational digital camera. (It's on my Christmas list under the heading "Yeah RIGHT!")

About twice a day we give our 7-year old puppy, Travis, a treat. The reason we still call him (and all dogs) a puppy is because I got him when he was 2 months old, and he was only 4 months old when I first introduced him to my niece who was 1 year old at the time. And, as everyone knows, the universal rule is that you have to refer to your dog as a puppy FOR. EVER. to children that young. That is why our neighbor's dog who is 14 and limping is still called a puppy by our children. Look, it isn't technically correct, but it is cute - so quit your TSK-ing!

Ahem.

As I was saying, Travis gets a steady supply of treats during the day. We have two different varieties of treats for our spoiled prince loving dog. One is the ever so healthy Begging Strips made of bacon-substitute and other questionable materials. These don't get chewed. I don't know how he manages to swallow something that big whole. The other treat is called Meat Bones. Travis is about 45 pounds which puts him at the high end of MEDIUM-sized and the very low end of LARGE-sized.

So, when I see the Meat Bone treats for large dogs, I figure it is better to have too much than too little. (This is why I can never shop at Costco, by the way.) I buy the 4000000-pound box of treats and heave it home.

Now, you may be falling asleep asking yourself what does this have to do with the intelligence level of my pooch. The answer is simple. Not a whole lot, but I like stories.

Anyway, my kids love giving Travis treats, so I leave this honor to them. I never really paid too much attention to my dog after he receives the treat. As far as I'm concerned, once a successful transfer of treat to no-limbs-coming-off has occurred, my job is done. But this time, I paid a little more attention to the dog after he received his Meat Bone treat for LARGE-sized dogs.

This treat is a little bigger than the width of his face, so it is good sized.  And, Travis has a tendency to gobble treats down, so I was curious to see how he manages to contain himself with this bone. Turns out, he has figured a way to wolf it down without risking too much injury to himself. He bites it in half.

I'm not talking about biting in half vertically, but he nibbles on it until the whole bone has split completely in half horizontally or length-wise. Seriously.

So, why can't a dog, that can perform such intricate work in order to wolf down half a bone, do something more constructive - like babysit my children or do laundry?