This really shows the personality difference, especially between Oringo and Makena. I love that Oringo took a moment to consider it, and decided to go to the one you pointed at, even though he knew you were wrong. I think he trusted that there was method to the madness. 😂 And while we could only see the back of the basenjis, I know what kind of look Makena was giving you. She was not impressed. And "little" Ipy was such a good girl, and you could see she wasn't as experienced in human communication as her elders. My oldest one is the more "primitive" one, and she doesn't care as much about what I tell her. My youngest, on the other hand, is really good at reading me. She understands me even when my communication is a jumbled mix of body language and words that should make no sense to her. I suspect she reads body language cues that I'm not even aware I'm making. She's also far more willing to work with me. She understands pointing really well, but I'm not sure she would follow my lead if she knew I was wrong. I doubt it.

My rescue pit mix has lots of primitive DNA (aka "wolfiness") according to her Embark DNA test. She ignored my pointing for a long time. I had to train her and she still isn't very good at it

you can always see them thinking

This is such an interesting experiment. The results were rather interesting. I am curious how my basenjis would do, but I kinda have an idea of what will happen.

Very interesting idea! I've noticed that My 2yo B does not recognize any pointing gestures, and when I divert my own attention to a particular place/thing, and also gesture towards it, it's hit and miss as to whether he will take the cue and redirect his focus. He's not particularly well trained though, so hasn't got the gesturing or following my commands down at all, but I always thought he'd be able to follow my gestures at least in terms of where he directs his attention. If there's food on the floor which he hasn't noticed yet, and I gesture towards it, he definitely doesn't follow my gesture, and I often have to specifically touch the food on the floor before he'll notice it. If I point to a bird or something in the garden, he also won't react until he hnotices it of his own accord. So I would say that your B's understanding of the gestures is for the most part due to the training they've received rather than an inerrant and intuitive understanding of the gesture concept. Could also be that my B is a bit of a dummy ha ha. Edit* I had a rescue wild-born Dingo puppy, rescued from the wild at about 5-6months old and severely unhealthy/underweight. Sadly he had significant long term health issues and passed at about 18months old due to seizures. His behavior was very similar to my B. Super independent, and intelligent, and also very loyal. Like my B, he'd always be cruising around checking in on everyone. The Dingo had half the energy of my B and slept a lot, but was twice as stubborn and almost impossible to divert his attention from something he was focused on or wanted to do. I'd say he was only slightly better at gesture recognition than my B. But they were both very similar in that regard.

Hello, I already have Hug at home, he is currently 4 months old and we have a serious problem, he is very stressed when taking him out of the house (it's cold), as soon as he sees the jacket to put on and the leash, he runs away and hides in corners, so we take him out and he is terribly afraid to walk around. the grass is squeaking and won't take any step HELP, no treats help, I'm devastated. Best regards 😢

This clearly proves women are smarter😂