This might sound cruel but when I get a puppy I walk by dragging my feet. When they get in my way, I don’t even slow down and they get “kicked” (shoved really). Two or three hits later, they learn to steer clear and it is never an issue again for the rest of their life, or until they are very old at which point I carry them from place to place. I hate that we outlive them by so much.
Meanwhile, my cat: "oh damn he didn’t see me, nearly kicked me to death, lemme get right back in-between’is leggies"
Cat: “Damnations, he survived! Until next time, hooman.”
Seriously, this is why I will NEVER agree with anyone who says cats are smarter than dogs.
Cats are pure instinct. I’ve kicked (on accident) two cats around the house several feet on multiple occasions because they’ll straight up run and try to rub on my legs while I’m in full stride. It’s seldom a soft contact, so I doubt they want to get tossed.
My sister also constantly complains how the males predate on the females. You know, cats. Literally predators, as in that is their instinct!
They’re just stupid predators, and all the cat people that defend them are in denial or just as instinctually dumb (emotionally reactive, in human terms).
People don’t “get” cats the way they “get” dogs, and cats don’t “get” people the way dogs “get” people.
But cats definitely do think, they can do some pretty complex problem solving, and can even be trained with the right methods and motivation. But you basically have to teach yourself how an alien race might process the world to be able to understand their behaviour. I’ve no clue if that makes them smarter than dogs. Dogs certainly understand humans better, and vice versa.
I don’t pretend to know what goes on in my cat’s head, but I’ve gotten pretty damn good at predicting behaviour, and even modifying it where needed.
And you’re right about one thing, getting a cat to unlearn something instinctual is basically impossible. Digging their claws into you when they are relaxed is a good example, no matter what you do, your cat is will always mercilessly knead whatever it’s sitting on when it’s happy.
For some reason walking into your legs as you move is one of those things they just keep doing, but I’ve gotten my cat to stop doing a variety of other things I didn’t want it doing.
My biggest success is kitchen counters. He no lingers jumps onto them. Ever. I’ve even taken him to relatives and friends, and he somehow knows the same rules apply in homes he’s never been in.
How’d you manage to get them off counters?
The best way is to change something so the cat doesn’t wanna be there in the first place.
I used a motion activated can of pressured air to scare him off the counter, changing its position so different parts of the counter were covered at different times. That, plus instantly pushing him off the counter whenever I got the chance.
He stopped hopping up there after just a few weeks of this, and I haven’t had to use the pressured air can since.
I did something similar with his habit of shredding the toilet paper. I set a metal measuring cup on the tp, so that whenever he’d go to unroll it the metal cup would loudly clang onto the tile floor. Had to manually reset the cup each time, but it took him less than a week to get the point.
Cat’s do problem solving very quickly (at least mine does), but I don’t think they see us people as a problem that needs solving. People like to joke that cats teach their owners to do more tricks than the other way around, and it’s true, I know exactly what ques mean pet me, play with me, swap my water, feed me, etc.
But if you change the environment so that it teaches the thing you want the cat to learn, it’s insane how quickly their behaviour changes.
I imagine the counter training wouldn’t have worked nearly as well if it was just me spraying canned air, rather than a consistent automatic device with no clear person operating it.
Brilliant, thank you for these insights, I needed them.
As opposed to dogs where you can just abuse and mistreat them and they’ll still be loyal! Clearly the smarter pet.
That’s a social trait, not an intelligence one. The fact you view kindness and loyalty as stupidity speaks volumes about your character…
Ever heard the term loyal to a fault? There’s loyal and there’s stupid.
Mine still doesn’t get the message.
Sometimes he really gets ploughed out of the way when I’m moving between rooms, still doesn’t stop him from pushing in front of me all the time though…
We have a mentally challenged cat who does this, but his favorite thing is to flop on the floor in front of you when you’re walking.
But, he also fucks with the great Dane while he’s eating, so maybe he just wants to die.
I don’t know that our cat is actually mentally challenged, but sometimes it sure seems it. Instead of avoiding our feet or even just walking in front of us normally, it’s like she remembers that she’s been bumped into before, doesn’t want it to happen again, and so blasts at MAXIMUM SPEED directly in front of us and usually gets smacked into anyway. There are so many ways to avoid this, and she picks the way most likely to result in getting trampled!
It also took her almost 8 years to figure out she can hop onto the table. I’m somewhat hopeful that the realization that she can jump on counters is something that will take longer than her lifespan for her to learn.
Our big dog will sometimes run between your legs when going outside. He’s the sweetest giant oaf, but he’s too big (and kinda dumb) to understand any consequences of what he’s doing. We try to mutually watch out for each other, but he gets excited sometimes and isn’t afraid (or aware?) to throw his weight around.
But on the other hand, it really seems like he understands something we don’t. The dog stares at clouds while his ears blow in the wind and lays down with 5 week foster kittens (never steps on them, but apparently WE’RE fair game). He’s our buddah dog
I drag my feet with my cats for a similar reason. They’re both black so collisions are inevitable at night, but by keeping my feet <1 inch off the ground I avoid stepping on their tail or anything but they still learn that sometimes I can’t see and they should be careful.
When my dog was a puppy, he used to always be under my feet (because he’s needy and the best). And he still kinda does it, but he understands the risks now
But when he was still learning: I was walking out the kitchen one day and he came from the side hall… and I was just walking, not trying to train. My poor dude got fully kicked by my stride, kinda literally body slammed into the wall. Like, foot to whole body… lifted and kicked against the wall :(
And he learned something that day… watch the fuck out, for self-preservation’s sake. We never had an issue like that again. I never tripped over him anymore; he instead learned how to maneuver. He’ll still get under the feet sometimes, but he never gets “kicked”. My dude learned that day, how to be aware and dodge.
He’s currently sniffing under the bathroom door while I poop and type this. He’s old now, and I’m heading to bed, so I’ma scoop him up into my bed and give him some snugs.
So yeah, never any ankle-breaking tripping after that little lesson, but still my needy boy. Did I mention he’s the best?
I’ve got a lurcher. They have an annoying habit of doing extremely close, high speed flybys. It wouldn’t be an issue except he kept messing it up and you’d get a glancing blow from a 30kg+ bullet.
The solution was slightly evil, but effective. We started sticking a foot out in front of him. It took a few tumbles, but he learnt to leave a meter or so of clearance.
Unfortunately, despite 6 years of effort, we have yet to break him of the high speed mud skids (Running towards us, then slamming on the brakes. He then skids to a stop in the mud in front of us, before accelerating away. This tends to spray us with mud).
All day every day. My dog has to walk at most 20cm in front of me at any given time, which causes quite the panic if she doesn’t guess the right door and has to catch up. Carrying soup has become an extreme sport
my cat loves to run ahead of me when going downstairs, I’ve tripped many times
Our dachshund is 14, epileptic and has degenerative disc disease. The old man doesn’t give one single fuck. He’s all black and burrows under blankets (or whatever he can find to root in, like a black t-shirt).
I have almost broken my life and limb on so many occasions, because I go to take a step… and holy hell, it’s a weiner dog under there! But I don’t want to step on him and hurt him, so instead I have to kinda go limp to avoid him.
He’s our dog that will trip tf outta you, and he firmly expects for you to evade… because he ain’t moving. He has little handicap ramps and everything, for him to go outside, because we love him… but hot damn, that dog EXPECTS you to know to watch out for HIM.
He has us well trained, ngl
From what I understand, this is typical dachshund behavior. They have so much personality for such a small stature. Ours also loves to burrow, it’s so cute.
My cat cuts me off more than bad drivers
He is also a bad driver
