Up A Tree Without A Squirrel

Even the smartest dog has dumb habits that make its owner wonder not only about its intelligence but its sanity.

My Border Collie, Jasper, was an exceptionally bright dog. He learned faster than my kids, with a better attitude. I had only to show Jasper a new thing once or twice and he happily did it. My kids, on the other hand, required four or five demonstrations and a significant bribe.

Jasper had one dumb habit that absolutely baffled me. While we walked through the woods on the farm, he would chase a squirrel up a tree. Unable to climb, he instead jumped up against the tree trunk until he could grab a branch with his teeth. Then he would hang there motionless, a look of intense concentration on his handsome face.

The kids would be rolling around on the ground laughing at him but I always stood and studied my dog in puzzlement. I wondered what (if anything) was going through his usually sharp brain at that moment.

If he was as intelligent as I thought he was, he would be thinking, “Okay, if I can just flip my lower body up six or seven feet, I might be able to make that next branch and pursue my prey.”

Or, perhaps he was simply trying to think of a way to save face: “Darn. My canine instincts once again overrode my innate intelligence. My jaws are getting tired. Any minute, I’m going to have to let go and fall back to Earth in front of my whole family.”

Then again, maybe I had vastly over-estimated his intelligence and his thought processes were actually going something like this: “Squirrel up tree. Jasper up tree. Jasper no got squirrel. What up wit dat?”

Inevitably, gravity won over intellect and Jasper would lose his grasp on the branch and fall. He never hurt himself — but he also never learned that his ambitious pursuit strategy had a major flaw.