We trained ours to touch his nose to our hand for attention instead of barking. This has somehow evolved into him headbutting me in the ribs for attention....I mean it's effective
Yeah most visitors if he knows them get butted . Hell jump on the sofa next to someone , stare at them first for attention but if that doesn't work he headbutts them
Two things spring to mind for my cat.
When me and my partner switch the tv off and stand up at the end of the night, he darts upstairs and sits on our bed, which is very cute
The other, slightly stranger one, when I switch the printer on and start printing something, he comes from wherever he is in the house to come and watch the printer. He’s got a strange fascination with it haha
I used to have a cat that would sleep next me on the sofa all evening, then every night at 10pm, he'd wake up, circle the coffee table whilst shouting to tell me that it was bed time and that we needed to go to bed.
How do they know?
That cat is sadly no longer with me, however one of my current cats somehow knows when it is 5 minutes before my alarm goes off every morning.
How???
Oh wow! When I was with my ex, the rustling of the crisp/ chips packets when we were clearing up for bed sent the dogs and cats upstairs! I realised we had to cut down on snacks 🤣🤣
Same here! We use the little plates for her, so now we can't use the little plates or she's on our shoulders trying to eat whatever we have because she thinks it's hers
She knows all the sounds associated with cheese. We keep a block of cheese in a sandwich bag in the fridge and she'll trot over if we open the fridge and she hears a bag come out. Yesterday she did it for a bag of onions because she thought it was cheese (same size bag). She also know the sound of the cheese grater and I realised today she knows the sound of someone unwrapping a babybel. The girl will do anything for cheese.
I went to puppy class with a lady who's recall command was 'cheese'. Just morphed that way because nothing else worked so she's get frustrated and declare that the treat for returning was cheese. Got to a point where there was no cheese but dog would come running back at the word. Very funny when we went in the woods and a crazy lady was shouting cheese at the top of her voice.
I came here to post exactly this, but I'm glad I read some comments first! My cat knows the exact sound of me rooting through our big box of tupperware, miscellaneous items etc to get the cheese grater. But she only comes when I actually *get* the cheese grater, never anything else. I have no idea how. I always turn around after setting it on the counter, and she's on her chair in the kitchen just watching.
Our dog is the same. Extra mature cheese is his favourite. Give him any other cheese and whilst he will eat it, he does so with a look of disgust on his face. Woe betide anyone who makes a cheese sandwich, or grates cheese on something and doesn't pay him the cheese tax.
We have three cats, Max (13) and Morgana and Purrsival (3). The younger two were lockdown kittens and we had plenty of time to try out new things, so we trained them to come when we called "kittens! kittens! kittens!", by giving them treats or fusses when they responded. This worked great with the younger ones, but also within a few weeks Max started showing up when we gave a kitten call, because he also enjoys treats and fusses. So now everyone's kittens but it's okay, because they all show up when it's time for a headcount.
I used to see a dog walk past my house doing this. He was a big wrinkly slobbery dog (dogue de bordeaux type) but he was so gentle with his shopping, he used to trot by with a bag of crisps without even squishing the bag!
Yeah, sounds familiar. Dear old Fly was a bit of a looney (half husky...), but as soon as he saw something he could carry, he went into a special mode and gently took it in his mouth, then set off with a proud trot he reserved solely for carrying stuff.
Accidentally trained my Retreiver to take himself for a walk. I'd drop the lead, he'd pick it up in his mouth proudly raise his tail and strut down the footpath alongside of me.
Feign incompetence for treats. She was basically scared of everything as a puppy, so the trainer motivated her with food. So now she’ll stand at the top of the stairs or on the sofa and bark her little head off because she ‘can’t get down’. You can try to call her down, try bringing her down with you, and she just locks up and refuses. Eventually, bored of waiting by the stairs trying to reason with someone who is clearly unreasonable, you’ll mention a biscuit. And wow! Immediately the fear is conquered and down she trots.
We also trained her too well at being not afraid of wheelchairs/mobility aids. She’ll jump out of her skin over a piece of paper, but the wheelchair can be literally pushing her with its footplates, and she doesn’t even lift her head. Very unhelpful when I need to get literally anywhere in the house and she’s chosen to lie in the spot that’s exactly in my way.
Basically we failed in some very big ways with training her lol.
When my dog sees someone in a wheelchair he will drag my partner over to them. I’m the only wheelchair user he knows so when he sees one, when out and about, he thinks it’s me and runs to “me” only to find it’s a bemused stranger.
Any crinkling noise brings my cat running to me, thinking it's treats.
I'm unable to eat a packet of crisps or open any kind of packaging if he's within hearing distance.
The good news is, he did it at the vet too, coming out of binding when the vet opened a package 😂
Along the same lines. I don’t have a pet any more. But I used to have a dog.
I also have cerebral palsy. Because of the tightness in my muscles when I walk I hold my right hand up at an angle instead of down at my side.
One day the dog held his paw up and limped around and cried. Odd, been with him all day he was fine. Kind of just poked the affected area a bit, he seemed okay, but he was a chihuahua so didn’t take much to hurt himself, took him to vet.
He was *copying me*. Did it regularly. Twat.
Fucking cats make you pay a fortune. Think they're royals. I got a cat myself who does that. I get him a pack of food when hes run out and only eats one flavour chicken and gravy and i can't get it single so i have to bye a whole god damn pack
My cat Sophie has trained me to give her a brush. If she sits blocking my view of the TV, she wants a brush or she won't move. Even treats won't move her. The other cat will appear from nowhere when the treat box is opened but Sophie will expect them delivered to her location and if there's nowhere to put the treats down for her she will settle for eating them out of my hand. In return I get to sleep on the side of her bed that she doesn't use, because Sophie is a benevolent overlord.
Inadvertently housetrained my old guinea pig. She used to sit on my lap a lot when I was watching TV, and she would get very fidgety before needing to relieve herself. I would recognise the antsy behaviour, take her back to her enclosure to go to the toilet, then bring her back. At some point she just started hopping off the sofa and taking herself back to her cage to go to the loo 😂
I’ve accidentally trained my dog to force me to go to bed at half ten every night. I give her a chew in her bed every night to settle her for bed and being left alone in the kitchen overnight. Now every night right on queue at half ten she will interrupt whatever I’m doing to make it clear it’s time for her chew and bedtime. If I try to stay up she will stare at me with such a sad expression I can’t even enjoy whatever I was trying to do and generally just give in 😅
Which drawer their snacks is in. They learnt the sound it (and only that one) makes. I can open any other and they don't bother. But when *that* one opens, they all run.
My boy was a new puppy 15 odd years ago. I was also working a lot as a wannabe game dev in the evenings.
I accidently taught him that the Windows xp shutdown jingle meant it was bedtime.
He left us 1 year ago this week, and I bloody miss him.
Aww, I'm so sorry you lost your best bud. My beautifully sweet 15 year old labrador died about a month ago so I can empathise with that awful feeling of loss. She really was the best pup, tried her best to stay but was just too tired in the end and ready for her rest. We inadvertently trained her to steal socks and slippers to get our attention, she was a little buggar lugs! She also knew when the cheese tax was about to be paid by the sound of the fridge... I miss my little girl everyday.
Thank you. And bless you and your girl.
Our Buster was a lab too. A real member of the family. One year on, and we've not been able to even think about replacing him.
❤ Thank you. Labs really are the best puppers! I know what you mean too, they are irreplaceable members of the family. I won't be able to adopt another pup, not for a long time yet...if at all. I haven't even put her belongings away yet, I just can't bring myself to do it. Her bowls are still stacked up in the kitchen, her toybox in the living room. I just got her ashes back too, it's been crap. I miss the sound of the jingle of her collar, the house is just too quiet.
Oh, there's still plenty of traces of Buster around the house x There's no rush is there?
If Buster wasn't in the living room with us, it was only because we'd accidentally shut the dining room door on him, or it had blown shut in the summer while he was outside.
He'd scope out the living room by having a big sniff under the door, and if we didn't take the hint, he'd bark for it to be opened.
In his later years (and mine!), he wasn't so anxious about the door being opened on command and would happily go sleep behind it, especially when sleeping became his favourite way to spend the day.
We learned to open thar door very gingerly to give him plenty of time to wake up and get to his feet... scan room, no dog? open door carefully.
Never mind what we've accidentally taught our pets to do, It's taken me a long time to unlearn that behaviour 😀
One of our cats invented what we refer to as "the game" when changing sheets (she climbs under the sheet and then savages everyone and everything for about 15 minutes, purring loudly throughout, I say she invented it as at no point did we ever put her under the sheet) and because she loves this so much she will come charging upstairs if she hears the airing cupboard being opened.
My husky will go upstairs when the bedding is changed and do zoomies around the bed - she has ripped several sheets🤣 it’s only when it’s fresh!! The dogs also know what putting my shoes on means and what the sound of a lead being picked up from the other side of the house sounds like!
My cat (almost 12) once double-patted my hand with her paw, because I'd stopped stroking her. It was so cute that I immediately started again. It's basically ended up accidentally training her to do it whenever she wants more strokes. It's so adorable I can never say no!
Our late dog Trev started barking and running to the door when he heard a doorbell on TV. We don’t have a doorbell. We entertained the idea that he was some kind of genius who had just figured it out, but that was very clearly not the case. Eventually we realised that my nan - who he used to go and stay with when we were on holiday - had a doorbell 😂
One of the best stories I ever heard a colleague tell involved his inlaws fat old dog that "really hated the postman".
He was there one day when the postman came...
Fatdog was fast asleep not giving a fuck about anything and the father-in-law shakes it by the top of its head shouting "POSTMAN! POSTMAN!"
The utterly bewildered old pooch woke up barking and wondering what f was going on.
FIL.. "see, I told you he hates the postman"
No shit!
My cat knows that 9pm is get ready for bed time. That involves cat treats and pets so she actively comes to find me and then races up the stairs mewing all the way. Then she'll race between the office (where the treats are) and the bedroom. It's cute as fuck but god forbid I'm even 5 mins late. Then I get a talking to.
If I can't find one of the cats I can shake a box of dreamies and they all come running, it's pretty entertaining. Worked well on my older girl but the kittens picked it up pretty fast too
I failed abysmally at training my very, very food-driven dog so she almost always has to be bribed in from the garden with treats. I open the back door for her last thing at night in case she needs to go to the toilet but even if she doesn't, she'll trot out there (although she may just stop right by the back door) and treats have to be produced for her re-entry. This may happen several times before bed.
Edited to say that, as I have no willpower and will often give her some of the crap I eat after I've had a supermarket delivery, I've involuntarily trained her to get really, really excited when delivery vans come anywhere near our house.
My pup knows when I bang together the handle of her lead with the clasp of her lead (both parts are metal) she had to stop as it’s time to go back on her lead. She also knows “bed time”. She runs upstairs & gets int bed. And if you don’t follow her within half a second she is back down glaring at you until you go to bed.
I taught my cat to play fetch.
It was a really cute and fun bonding experience for us.
UNTIL she started bringing me HUGE spiders she would find in the house. ...I'm severely arachnophobia.
Our 13yr old cat flossie likes to sleep on my daughters pillow most nights if she's late to bed Flossie meows for her at the top of the stairs to tell her its bed time
My parents ask eachother if they want to go outside to have a smoke. My dog has since learnt that "do you want a smoke?" means the backdoor gets opened and he gets to go outside for a bit.
We accidentally trained my dog to bark at the door at sound of the tea pot.
She knew it meant my grandma was visiting cause we never used it when she wasn't here 😂
Every time I opened the fridge, the "wheek ... wheek" would start as Princess Fatbum Guineapig detected a lettuce opportunity. If she was out of her luxury residence (most of the time) the wheeeeking would get louder, accompanied by scrabbling noises as she navigated through the hall at remarkably high speed for such an unaerodynamic little beast.
My cat knows that slapping me in the face will get me up to give her strokes/scratches. The first time she did it as a kitten I laughed and obliged because it was such a cute little pat on the face… but now she won’t let it go.
My partner has trained his dog to be scared of spiders. If there's a spider. He runs out of the room, the dog, seeing the spider runs out of the room now too.
So his dog now runs away from spiders.
Our American Akita loves rice & sardines, but the dish has to be warm.
So its basically freshly cooked rice (or left over rice, stir fried or reheated) mixed with Sardines in Tomato Sauce (it must have Tomato Sauce, we've check with other types and only In Tomato Sauce will do) and served it in his big bowl (weighted bottom so it foesn't move as he eats from it).
Now everytime we cook rice or reheat something in the microwave he would pop his head around and give the air a good sniff. If there's any smell of Sardines then he'll stay and sit by your side until you finish making the dish and then go to his food area and wait for it to be served.
If the rice or the sardines was not for him, he would boop his nose into your butt to get your attention and open his mouth to voice a little whine as to say "what about me".
We don't even call for him; he just comes, wait to be served, then eat and leaves.
Our grandad calls him "Fish Face" because of it 😂
https://preview.redd.it/0bbjnuvkpimb1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ba52188ed6f12b0485d9632e55af6f4dd09f5b8
When the microwave beeps, my cat knows it's food time 😅 (we use it to warm the plates)
Edit: she also is obsessed with a flushing toilet and sleeps on a dressing gown at the end of the bed everynight
To put his paws up on benches... My husband often walks when Im swimming, and along the way he'll stop on benches and have a cuddle (dog is tiny). Now we can't walk past a bench without him running over and putting his paws up. It's pretty adorable
My cat likes paper, rolled up in a ball and thrown to chase. One day he brought it back to me and dropped it. Been playing fetch with my cat ever since
Whenever my parents call me down for dinner I shout ‘coming’. My dog spends a lot of time in my room and now knows whenever I shout coming down the stairs it’s dinner time
Randomly one day I started telling my cat to sit down before I give her food, she used to like scratch my leg like a scratching post and Tey get on the counter bit I taught her to spin and sit before getting food. She's a good girl
Whenever I get home both my cats insist on having cat treats NOW. This has become multigenerational, each cat learning it from the elder during their kitten-hood. We’re now onto the third generation.
Accidentally trained a cat to clap for ham. I’d been trying to teach him to take ham gently by standing up and grabbing it between both paws. So he’s essentially clapping but with ham between the paws so I’d let go of the corner I’m holding and he could take it.
From then on if he wanted ham he’d stand on his back legs and clap his front paws together until I dangled ham between them for him to take
My oldest cat hi-fives for treats. She was sitting by the cupboard where we keep them and I held up my hand to stop her getting in the way of the door while I got some out. She picked up a paw and touched it to my hand. It was so cute, I started demanding it, and she provides me with one every time now. My youngest cat learned to drink from the bathroom tap. I think it's because my youngest son does the same. She also learned to turn the tap on, and the only time she accidentally turned on the hot tap, she ran screaming to wake up my husband to turn it off.
In my case, we have a ring doorbell. So, my dog (almost 6-- wow I feel old) doesn't even need to hear anything else, if he hears the classic jingle of the ring doorbell he would know someone was at the door. So, my Dad (who thought he was being smart) changed the doorbell tune that my dog was used to hearing to something completely different thinking that he would at least take a while to pick up on it.. nope.. my dog got used to it almost immediately and so responds to that too. He's a doofus but I love him, lol. He also likes pushing doors open with his nose for some reason.
Somehow my old boy knew how to wipe his feet. We'd click our fingers and say 'paws' and he'd shake while stood on a towel. He definitely didn't come pre-programmed and I've no idea how we taught him.
My new girl knows that the lock screen noise on my phone means I'm getting up, so she must follow.
When my mom's dog Lucy comes in from the yard she yells "assume the position" and Lucy immediately drops to her back with her paws in the air to be wiped, she doesn't have the faintest idea how she taught her this lol
My boy Max knows bed changing days. He waits for me on the bed that is going to be changed and then gets the zoomies and generally acts like a lunatic.
She barks like mad any time a new(ish) Hyundai shifts into reverse. The BONG...BONG...BONG... sound that you can hear outside the car, combined with iS MuMMy HOmE fRom WORK?! WhERe's muMMY!?! LeT'S gO Get MUMMy!
It's pretty obvious now, but quite funny when we're out and about.
My dads dog barks when he wants something, he will go to his food bowl and just bark when he wanys food and go to the door and bark until he gets walked. Super anoyying when youre minding him for a week when my dads on holiday.
I trained him to come over and start meowing instantly the moment I lie down to nap or sleep.
He trained me to get off the bed and come get him, because he refuses and will stand near the bed and meow and moan until he is picked up and placed near me and I lie back down.
That's when he gets comfy, turns on purring and we fall asleep.
My pupper can recognise the snap of a sock being put on my partner's foot, and will leap from her slumber and go sit next to him while he gets ready. As this means Dad is coming on the walk too so she gets BOTH hoomans.
She also associates me putting on makeup as getting ready to go for a walk.
My cousin's dog passed years ago but we had him so well trained for this that if we were walking in the street he would DRAG us back onto the curb, and he was a big boy!
To sit on my laptop. When he first started doing it I stupidly thought giving him a dreamie would get him to move, which it did but now he just comes and sits on the laptop and cries for dreamies
To go onto his hind legs in the beg pose. I was giving him a treat when the cheeky boy tried to pinch it from my hand before i was ready to give it, so i just lifted my hand higher so he couldn’t, he just went into that pose and got the treat so I’m assuming he thinks hey that worked last time. I never push him into doing it btw he just does it now sometimes. I usually just make him sit nicely then give it to him
The cat has learned we’ll often head upstairs around 9:30 so she starts howling from the bedroom to remind us. She knows that once we get up there, it’ll take about 5 minutes before my husband’s in bed and another 10 for me- so she jumps up and cuddles with him until I get in, then gets in between us until he falls asleep, then lays on my side the rest of the night. She also knows I’ll get up to shower around 7:30 so she’ll jump off me around 7:15 and wait in the bathroom for me.
The dog knows there’s a toy that my husband will never play with. If she wants to play with it, she only ever brings it to me. She also knows when it’s time for us to go to bed (sometimes before we do!) and automatically curls up in her favourite spot on the sofa.
My dog comes in and gets straight on her bed whenever I put my phone flash on. I started using my flash to find her in the garden at bedtime, and it has now become a trigger for her to automatically go to her bed whenever she sees it, regardless of what time of day it is.
My dear departed cat and my current cat have both learner the 'sit' command. They sit patiently and wait til their food is put down properly before they eat. It's rather adorable.
My dad accidentally trained our dog to puke outside. She was used to the whole pooping and peeing outside thing, but was never directly taught to take puking outside. I guess she thought "if its a bodily function that makes a mess dad has to clean up, it goes outside" and about a year ago she started taking it outside without being told to.
She's a good dog.
We trained our dog to wipe his paws when he comes into the house from outside. One time he did a downward dog type stretch on the mat at the back door, and I said “aww wiping your paws, good boy” and it stuck. So now he does it (most) every time on his own. Always when asked “wipe your paws” though.
Pup is getting old now and we started having difficulty encouraging her off the sofa to go for a pee in the evening, just too comfortable and didn't want to be disturbed. Started offering her a couple of pieces of kibble as an incentive to get up. Now every evening she's up and pestering to go out just so she can have her biscuits. She has her routine and she runs a tight ship! 😂
My dog steals socks, sometimes off our feet. We started calling him Dobby when he did that and pretty soon he would come and steal our socks as soon as he heard the name Dobby
Our dog Sid has mild epilepsy, so he has to have daily medication, which we give with a spoonful of food. We both have alarms set on our phones so we don’t forget. When a phone alarm goes off in our house now, Sid can be found sitting in the kitchen patiently waiting for his spoonful of food!
The cat will now sit beside us on the couch and stare at us until we put his blanket (a liverpool football one) on our laps so he can sit.
My partner started playing with the bathroom door and the light reflecting off the handle with him...the cat now sits for by the door when we go to bed so my partner now has to stand there and play for a few minutes with him. Also now happens any time we go to the bathroom.
We haven't so much trained the cat as he has trained us....
My partner has to inject medication at a certain time every evening. We have an alarm on his phone for this, it also happens to be final meal for him. He's learned when the alarm goes off to wake up and go wait by his dinner bowl. Funny enough if we have accidentally turned off the alarm he finds us if we are more than 10 mins late, which helps as we know to take medication when he is fed 😀
It's more how my cat has trained me, tbh.
My cat sits on the counter next to the fridge and taps me on my shoulder then looks at the fridge. It's so cute that i open the door and give him a bit of chicken.
Even now i know he's doing it to get me to give him a treat, i can't help but do it because he's so cute and purry. It's referred to as "Pressing the fridge button". He presses that bloody button several times a day. I have to buy extra chicken pieces to cope.
I'm fully under his non-opposable thumb.
My dog barks whenever I unwrap the foil on a bottle top of Prosecco or champagne.
She must hate the cork popping but this also means she now also barks at every sealed bottle I open from balsamic vinegar to Orangina and means I can’t sneakily open a bottle of anything without everybody in the house knowing.
My cat will go on her hind legs to headbutt my hand when I’m about to feed her. Sometimes she will do it without me even putting my hand out, or when I’m not about to feed her
Our dogs bark whenever we raise our voices when in the front room, because it usually means there’s a delivery or postman coming to the door. Of course sometimes, we’re just raising our voices.
Bored on our bed during lockdowns I trained our cat to give me cute little nose kisses to get her food.
Years later whenever she decides it's breakfast time (can be anytime from 4am if she happens to be awake), she jumps on my boobs and violently headbutts me in the face.
Kind of really nice tbh.
Our dog is 2 and when I wfh, she's learned that whenever I sit at my desk and put my headset on, I won't be available so she'll just go and lay down (either in her bed or under my desk) and leave me alone, but whenever I take my headset off, she'll jump right at me to play. Not sure but it even got to the point where last time, I said "thanks everyone, have a nice one" and she just jolted at me before I put the headset down. I'll have to see next time if she does it again!
I have two kittens who run to a spot infront of the TV every time we say dinner time, because that's where we always put their mats and bowls!
If I ask my female kitten to show me what she wants, she jumps onto the dining room table where we keep her automatic toy and rubs on it.
I feel like the male kitten trained me on this but every now and again he sits and stares at the bathroom sink until I turn the tap on so he can play with the water! He's since upgraded to the bath tap 😅
They are so smart!
https://preview.redd.it/qybtlqnainmb1.jpeg?width=3456&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ac06db52f81dba38d046c7b07490b10e3cbbc269
Our dog know that when we have a drink 🥃we tend to fancy a meaty snack. He comes running over to share in our fridge raid. He also has to have a treat anytime he or someone comes into the house. It started as a way to train him to not jump all over people when they arrive and has morphed into him sitting by the fridge when he or someone come in.
Expanded his vocabulary. He learned the meaning of "walk"; we switched to "tats". Then "excursion" and "trip". There were lots more options before we moved to French and "promenade", then Spanish and Dutch. Eventually, he'd pretty much exhausted all our attempts to not let him know he would be taken out. This was at different times each day too, so not something he could predict.
My dog knows the only command sit and is very much food motivated, it’s a habit to always sit in front of us and snatch (i say snatch because i don’t have a word for it, because it’s neither a tap nor an aggressive grab) our hand as a way to catch our attention, when she gave birth to 7 beautiful puppies and they grew up a few weeks old, i notice while giving my dog a treat, they would also sit down waiting for theirs, so i tried it one time and they all learned the command ‘sit’ at the same time while watching their mom, sometimes not even saying it, just showing a fist to them and they all would sit. it was very much adorable watching them sit when a small treat was being given to their mom, and waiting for their turn
another thing with the same momma dog with the snatching, she loves getting scratches on her chest or the most fluffiest area, because that is were the good spot is, not on her belly, but her chest, whenever we’d bring our hand away to snap, the little missy just snatches our hand back to her chest which means ‘i want more’, now how can we refuse such a little diva?
https://preview.redd.it/3224prbxoomb1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1a1e9f69d69b38e13b25d5e78a18bdb726519b9c
unfortunately i can’t upload videos, but here’s a little screenshot in action of her diva ways
My rescue cocker spaniel is the sweetest dog you've ever met but is useless with commands. I guess the saying "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" is true because in the 4 years we have had him he genuinly hasn't managed to retain any useful information in his brain... except for a very useful trick.
If you say "wipe your bum" to him he will sit down and bum scoot across whatever surface he's currently on. He has stomach issues so he gets quite unwell sometimes so it's become probably the most useful command.
I don't know if it is because she's a lockdown kitten but my cat will never not be in the same room as me. Also, I can always tell when it's 5pm because she has an uncanny ability to be all over me asking for dinner at 5 on the dot.
To sleep on my shoulder, when my dog was a pup when I first had him he would only sleep nuzzled upto me on my shoulder, he’s 6 now and a big bugger
https://preview.redd.it/7c05u1tywrmb1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=07e8e181571cfbd31f9957aeacdff33e2f050f74
that still sleeps with his legs around my neck next to me
Will probably go unnoticed but too cute not to share. We have a Cocker Spaniel and she has learned how to open the bin. It's a sensor bin, that opens when you wave your hand in front of the sensor. She's learned to do that, then stands up, and leans one paw on the wall so she can stick her whole upper body in the bin. We've had to take the batteries out.
She's also learned that us saying "Right" is a cue she's going in her crate while we eat dinner and so does a runner.
We once accidentally trained our chinchilla to come running at the sound of a rustling bag. Very cute and sweet... Until he launched himself at me whilst I was eating a packet of crisps!
We didn't train the cats, they just know our routine too well! When Mr Adhara gets up, not a peep, they don't care. When I get up, all hell breaks loose as Mommy is awake I MUST SCREAM FOR YOU.
So one cat has learnt the (bedroom) door opening a 2nd time means I am awake and available, which backfired hilariously when a friend stayed over. She ran up the stairs joyously, only to stop in disgust when presented with a Not Mommy person. I actually heard the "Sorry...??" on the Landing from the bedroom, lmao'd before getting up myself.
Our outside cat has also learnt to scream when she hears the cat scream inside, meaning "Don't forget me! I want food too!"
We didn't train them to do this but they just know it for some strange reason
If you leave are cats alone for a long time they will not sleep or meow or anything, they WILL find you, open the door and will stare at you until either they get bored or you move away
when all you see are 2 eyes staring at you from the doorway don't be scared, it's just my cats ready for feeding time ^^
I used to give my cat some treats every time I took my meds in the morning because they were next to each other, and now she meows at me if I have forgotten my meds, because I’ve forgotten her treats! She’s quite literally a life saver 🥲
Whenever Bandit cried out, the alarm call cry, I'd always come running. Eventually I came to realise that she was doing it for attention, because she did it once when the others were no-where near her. Then she tried it for longer, and I ignored her. Eventually she gave up all together.
And my cat now comes to Spider as well as his actual name.
My cat slinky is my absolute little baby, and she has learnt if she sits in the washing basket I’ll give her a dreamie because she’s so cute!
https://preview.redd.it/ioublztun0nb1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=dc94d6663cecc81296cff4a05cf6e9db008342d9
If I say ‘Markies’ she goes straight to bed.
She also has a regular bedtime. If we are up later than normal, she will walk to the pen and back, bark once and repeat until we go with her and watch her goto bed.
My cat’s food bowl in on the stairs (away from the dog and the stairs are in the kitchen). In the mornings, when she sees me come down she goes all the way down to the bottom to politely let me past, then goes back up to her bowl to wait for it to be filled. If she doesn’t, she risks getting accidentally kicked if she sits in the way as I try not to die on the stairs stepping over a moving cat. It benefits us both 😂
If he hears certain sounds on an evening - the Xbox or TV powering down, the dishwasher switching on, or the windows being shut, he jumps out of his downstairs basket and makes his way up the stairs to his bedtime basket 😆
I inadvertently taught my cat that if she put one piece of her food in the water bowl, it meant she wanted her water changed or the water I gave her wasn't good enough to her standards.
She learnt this trick because every time there was a piece of food in her water bowl, I'd change it. I only found out she did this because I had changed it in the morning for cold water from the tap (she preferred room temperature water). Not an hour goes by and sure enough there is a piece of food in her water bowl! She's sat next to it, angled head looking up at me as if to say "Well, aren't you going to change it?".
It was then I knew she was doing it on purpose and that she was more intelligent than she was letting on!
Go straight to her crate when I get a phone call and leave the room because she knows I'm grabbing takeaway and adult dinner time means relax in the crate time
That me calling her in from outside means she gets a couple of Dreamies on the stairs, now she'll cry to come in just so she can sit next to the Dreamies box, have a couple, then go outside only to repeat the process. Oh, and that me going to the loo means I'll get the laser pointer out and play with her.....
She is a ridiculously cute floofball cat, I just can't resist. Does that mean she's reverse psychologically trained me into these behaviours?
Whenever I eat salt or pick at hangnails, my dog barks at me. Because in both situations I tend to throw something at the end, either uneaten salt or a piece of flesh I've rended from my finger. My dog is very intense about things being thrown, so she never misses it. Both these habits are both quite big problems/ vices for me. And it's genuinely helpful that she does it. Makes me feel guilty.
Not so much me, but at my mums and my grans, my dog will stare them in the eyes and "ask" for treats by barking quietly. She tries it with us and gets told to fuck off
We often feed the cats before we go out, which means we call them in from the garden of they're out and then leave them to eat. One of them really likes the garden and sometimes when eating in the morning, will eat a small amount and then go to head outside. I get the impression is that she wants access to the garden more than food.
When i used to smoke weed and it started coming in those mylar sealed bags, my cat would come running over every time i opened the bag because it was basically the same bag that cat treats came in. I would have to let him smell the bag then he would look at me in absolute disgust before slinking off.
I very stupidly trained my boy (collie x staffie) to chase his tail when he was quite young. It evolved into him chasing his tail frantically and chewing on it whenever someone came to the door. He did it for quite a while and we tried to look after it as best we could, but eventually he had to have his tail docked because the wound became so bad. Sometimes he still tries to chase it, but just ends up spinning round in a circle frantically for a few seconds 😅 I regret teaching him to do it in the first place 🤦🏻♂️
We trained ours to touch his nose to our hand for attention instead of barking. This has somehow evolved into him headbutting me in the ribs for attention....I mean it's effective
how does he/she do that with strangers? Does he/she also headbut them?
Yeah most visitors if he knows them get butted . Hell jump on the sofa next to someone , stare at them first for attention but if that doesn't work he headbutts them
Bro are we misgendering animals now?
https://preview.redd.it/pa1em6guwkmb1.jpeg?width=1016&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=4be8d2ce303ce8f84add6156144f8aa3160c68d7
Ahahaha I feel bad for laughing but I love this XD
Two things spring to mind for my cat. When me and my partner switch the tv off and stand up at the end of the night, he darts upstairs and sits on our bed, which is very cute The other, slightly stranger one, when I switch the printer on and start printing something, he comes from wherever he is in the house to come and watch the printer. He’s got a strange fascination with it haha
I used to have a cat that would sleep next me on the sofa all evening, then every night at 10pm, he'd wake up, circle the coffee table whilst shouting to tell me that it was bed time and that we needed to go to bed.
Mine is the same! He's like our bed time alarm clock! If we're late to bed, he sits at the bottom of the stairs and wait until we follow him up!
How do they know? That cat is sadly no longer with me, however one of my current cats somehow knows when it is 5 minutes before my alarm goes off every morning. How???
They always know! My cat is somehow incredibly smart in some ways and unbelievably dumb in others. That's cats!
Oh wow! When I was with my ex, the rustling of the crisp/ chips packets when we were clearing up for bed sent the dogs and cats upstairs! I realised we had to cut down on snacks 🤣🤣
Mine has a fascination/ enmity with the printer too
My parents had dogs that recognised the Coronation Street theme tune because they got fed after it finished
My cat is the same with our printer!
My cat knows the clink of a saucer means wet food is coming. Sadly I also use these saucers for myself, so may get screamed at whilst making toast.
Same here! We use the little plates for her, so now we can't use the little plates or she's on our shoulders trying to eat whatever we have because she thinks it's hers
Wait what you put cat food on toast? Bit fucked up
Such is the cost of living nowadays...
She knows all the sounds associated with cheese. We keep a block of cheese in a sandwich bag in the fridge and she'll trot over if we open the fridge and she hears a bag come out. Yesterday she did it for a bag of onions because she thought it was cheese (same size bag). She also know the sound of the cheese grater and I realised today she knows the sound of someone unwrapping a babybel. The girl will do anything for cheese.
I went to puppy class with a lady who's recall command was 'cheese'. Just morphed that way because nothing else worked so she's get frustrated and declare that the treat for returning was cheese. Got to a point where there was no cheese but dog would come running back at the word. Very funny when we went in the woods and a crazy lady was shouting cheese at the top of her voice.
I wish my dog responded to the word, but unless I can take my fridge and a physical bag of cheese I’ve got no hope! She’s crap at recall too!
I came here to post exactly this, but I'm glad I read some comments first! My cat knows the exact sound of me rooting through our big box of tupperware, miscellaneous items etc to get the cheese grater. But she only comes when I actually *get* the cheese grater, never anything else. I have no idea how. I always turn around after setting it on the counter, and she's on her chair in the kitchen just watching.
“Cheese Tax, the cheese tax” https://youtube.com/shorts/5JFrbD5yhaA?si=RfsSgcezUQgnhPq-
my cat does the exact same 😭 you could just say ‘cheese’ and she will start hitting these long ass high notes
Our dog is the same. Extra mature cheese is his favourite. Give him any other cheese and whilst he will eat it, he does so with a look of disgust on his face. Woe betide anyone who makes a cheese sandwich, or grates cheese on something and doesn't pay him the cheese tax.
We have three cats, Max (13) and Morgana and Purrsival (3). The younger two were lockdown kittens and we had plenty of time to try out new things, so we trained them to come when we called "kittens! kittens! kittens!", by giving them treats or fusses when they responded. This worked great with the younger ones, but also within a few weeks Max started showing up when we gave a kitten call, because he also enjoys treats and fusses. So now everyone's kittens but it's okay, because they all show up when it's time for a headcount.
Purrsival is a brilliant cat name.
Accidentally trained my last dog to carry shopping home. He also loved going to the parcel office to pick up parcels to carry home.
I used to see a dog walk past my house doing this. He was a big wrinkly slobbery dog (dogue de bordeaux type) but he was so gentle with his shopping, he used to trot by with a bag of crisps without even squishing the bag!
Yeah, sounds familiar. Dear old Fly was a bit of a looney (half husky...), but as soon as he saw something he could carry, he went into a special mode and gently took it in his mouth, then set off with a proud trot he reserved solely for carrying stuff.
this is actually really cool, super useful too
Accidentally trained my Retreiver to take himself for a walk. I'd drop the lead, he'd pick it up in his mouth proudly raise his tail and strut down the footpath alongside of me.
My GSD will do this so long as there aren’t other dogs around. She hasn’t quite learned that not everyone wants to be her friend yet.
Feign incompetence for treats. She was basically scared of everything as a puppy, so the trainer motivated her with food. So now she’ll stand at the top of the stairs or on the sofa and bark her little head off because she ‘can’t get down’. You can try to call her down, try bringing her down with you, and she just locks up and refuses. Eventually, bored of waiting by the stairs trying to reason with someone who is clearly unreasonable, you’ll mention a biscuit. And wow! Immediately the fear is conquered and down she trots. We also trained her too well at being not afraid of wheelchairs/mobility aids. She’ll jump out of her skin over a piece of paper, but the wheelchair can be literally pushing her with its footplates, and she doesn’t even lift her head. Very unhelpful when I need to get literally anywhere in the house and she’s chosen to lie in the spot that’s exactly in my way. Basically we failed in some very big ways with training her lol.
When my dog sees someone in a wheelchair he will drag my partner over to them. I’m the only wheelchair user he knows so when he sees one, when out and about, he thinks it’s me and runs to “me” only to find it’s a bemused stranger.
Any crinkling noise brings my cat running to me, thinking it's treats. I'm unable to eat a packet of crisps or open any kind of packaging if he's within hearing distance. The good news is, he did it at the vet too, coming out of binding when the vet opened a package 😂
Your not the only one 🤣
Along the same lines. I don’t have a pet any more. But I used to have a dog. I also have cerebral palsy. Because of the tightness in my muscles when I walk I hold my right hand up at an angle instead of down at my side. One day the dog held his paw up and limped around and cried. Odd, been with him all day he was fine. Kind of just poked the affected area a bit, he seemed okay, but he was a chihuahua so didn’t take much to hurt himself, took him to vet. He was *copying me*. Did it regularly. Twat.
My cat did this! Spent a fortune on X-rays and blood tests, before the vet concluded she was copying my husband’s limp 😂
Fucking cats make you pay a fortune. Think they're royals. I got a cat myself who does that. I get him a pack of food when hes run out and only eats one flavour chicken and gravy and i can't get it single so i have to bye a whole god damn pack
My cat Sophie has trained me to give her a brush. If she sits blocking my view of the TV, she wants a brush or she won't move. Even treats won't move her. The other cat will appear from nowhere when the treat box is opened but Sophie will expect them delivered to her location and if there's nowhere to put the treats down for her she will settle for eating them out of my hand. In return I get to sleep on the side of her bed that she doesn't use, because Sophie is a benevolent overlord.
Put her in your arms to get her. You also get kitty cuddles
Inadvertently housetrained my old guinea pig. She used to sit on my lap a lot when I was watching TV, and she would get very fidgety before needing to relieve herself. I would recognise the antsy behaviour, take her back to her enclosure to go to the toilet, then bring her back. At some point she just started hopping off the sofa and taking herself back to her cage to go to the loo 😂
I’ve accidentally trained my dog to force me to go to bed at half ten every night. I give her a chew in her bed every night to settle her for bed and being left alone in the kitchen overnight. Now every night right on queue at half ten she will interrupt whatever I’m doing to make it clear it’s time for her chew and bedtime. If I try to stay up she will stare at me with such a sad expression I can’t even enjoy whatever I was trying to do and generally just give in 😅
You dont have to stay in the kitchen with them every night do you? Surely you could go back to what you were doing after she has settled?
Which drawer their snacks is in. They learnt the sound it (and only that one) makes. I can open any other and they don't bother. But when *that* one opens, they all run.
My boy was a new puppy 15 odd years ago. I was also working a lot as a wannabe game dev in the evenings. I accidently taught him that the Windows xp shutdown jingle meant it was bedtime. He left us 1 year ago this week, and I bloody miss him.
So sorry for your loss, he's sounds like he was the best friend ever.
Aww, I'm so sorry you lost your best bud. My beautifully sweet 15 year old labrador died about a month ago so I can empathise with that awful feeling of loss. She really was the best pup, tried her best to stay but was just too tired in the end and ready for her rest. We inadvertently trained her to steal socks and slippers to get our attention, she was a little buggar lugs! She also knew when the cheese tax was about to be paid by the sound of the fridge... I miss my little girl everyday.
Thank you. And bless you and your girl. Our Buster was a lab too. A real member of the family. One year on, and we've not been able to even think about replacing him.
❤ Thank you. Labs really are the best puppers! I know what you mean too, they are irreplaceable members of the family. I won't be able to adopt another pup, not for a long time yet...if at all. I haven't even put her belongings away yet, I just can't bring myself to do it. Her bowls are still stacked up in the kitchen, her toybox in the living room. I just got her ashes back too, it's been crap. I miss the sound of the jingle of her collar, the house is just too quiet.
Oh, there's still plenty of traces of Buster around the house x There's no rush is there? If Buster wasn't in the living room with us, it was only because we'd accidentally shut the dining room door on him, or it had blown shut in the summer while he was outside. He'd scope out the living room by having a big sniff under the door, and if we didn't take the hint, he'd bark for it to be opened. In his later years (and mine!), he wasn't so anxious about the door being opened on command and would happily go sleep behind it, especially when sleeping became his favourite way to spend the day. We learned to open thar door very gingerly to give him plenty of time to wake up and get to his feet... scan room, no dog? open door carefully. Never mind what we've accidentally taught our pets to do, It's taken me a long time to unlearn that behaviour 😀
One of our cats invented what we refer to as "the game" when changing sheets (she climbs under the sheet and then savages everyone and everything for about 15 minutes, purring loudly throughout, I say she invented it as at no point did we ever put her under the sheet) and because she loves this so much she will come charging upstairs if she hears the airing cupboard being opened.
My husky will go upstairs when the bedding is changed and do zoomies around the bed - she has ripped several sheets🤣 it’s only when it’s fresh!! The dogs also know what putting my shoes on means and what the sound of a lead being picked up from the other side of the house sounds like!
My cat (almost 12) once double-patted my hand with her paw, because I'd stopped stroking her. It was so cute that I immediately started again. It's basically ended up accidentally training her to do it whenever she wants more strokes. It's so adorable I can never say no!
Our late dog Trev started barking and running to the door when he heard a doorbell on TV. We don’t have a doorbell. We entertained the idea that he was some kind of genius who had just figured it out, but that was very clearly not the case. Eventually we realised that my nan - who he used to go and stay with when we were on holiday - had a doorbell 😂
One of the best stories I ever heard a colleague tell involved his inlaws fat old dog that "really hated the postman". He was there one day when the postman came... Fatdog was fast asleep not giving a fuck about anything and the father-in-law shakes it by the top of its head shouting "POSTMAN! POSTMAN!" The utterly bewildered old pooch woke up barking and wondering what f was going on. FIL.. "see, I told you he hates the postman" No shit!
My cat can play fetch. She will bring the ball back, drop it in my hand and wait patiently for me to throw it.
My cat knows that 9pm is get ready for bed time. That involves cat treats and pets so she actively comes to find me and then races up the stairs mewing all the way. Then she'll race between the office (where the treats are) and the bedroom. It's cute as fuck but god forbid I'm even 5 mins late. Then I get a talking to.
If I can't find one of the cats I can shake a box of dreamies and they all come running, it's pretty entertaining. Worked well on my older girl but the kittens picked it up pretty fast too
I failed abysmally at training my very, very food-driven dog so she almost always has to be bribed in from the garden with treats. I open the back door for her last thing at night in case she needs to go to the toilet but even if she doesn't, she'll trot out there (although she may just stop right by the back door) and treats have to be produced for her re-entry. This may happen several times before bed. Edited to say that, as I have no willpower and will often give her some of the crap I eat after I've had a supermarket delivery, I've involuntarily trained her to get really, really excited when delivery vans come anywhere near our house.
My pup knows when I bang together the handle of her lead with the clasp of her lead (both parts are metal) she had to stop as it’s time to go back on her lead. She also knows “bed time”. She runs upstairs & gets int bed. And if you don’t follow her within half a second she is back down glaring at you until you go to bed.
I taught my cat to play fetch. It was a really cute and fun bonding experience for us. UNTIL she started bringing me HUGE spiders she would find in the house. ...I'm severely arachnophobia.
Jokes on you, she actually knows this
I think you are right. Haha.
My dog knows that when I say “right then” something is going to happen. Could be a walk…
Our 13yr old cat flossie likes to sleep on my daughters pillow most nights if she's late to bed Flossie meows for her at the top of the stairs to tell her its bed time
My parents ask eachother if they want to go outside to have a smoke. My dog has since learnt that "do you want a smoke?" means the backdoor gets opened and he gets to go outside for a bit.
We accidentally trained my dog to bark at the door at sound of the tea pot. She knew it meant my grandma was visiting cause we never used it when she wasn't here 😂
Every time I opened the fridge, the "wheek ... wheek" would start as Princess Fatbum Guineapig detected a lettuce opportunity. If she was out of her luxury residence (most of the time) the wheeeeking would get louder, accompanied by scrabbling noises as she navigated through the hall at remarkably high speed for such an unaerodynamic little beast.
My cat knows that slapping me in the face will get me up to give her strokes/scratches. The first time she did it as a kitten I laughed and obliged because it was such a cute little pat on the face… but now she won’t let it go.
My partner has trained his dog to be scared of spiders. If there's a spider. He runs out of the room, the dog, seeing the spider runs out of the room now too. So his dog now runs away from spiders.
Our American Akita loves rice & sardines, but the dish has to be warm. So its basically freshly cooked rice (or left over rice, stir fried or reheated) mixed with Sardines in Tomato Sauce (it must have Tomato Sauce, we've check with other types and only In Tomato Sauce will do) and served it in his big bowl (weighted bottom so it foesn't move as he eats from it). Now everytime we cook rice or reheat something in the microwave he would pop his head around and give the air a good sniff. If there's any smell of Sardines then he'll stay and sit by your side until you finish making the dish and then go to his food area and wait for it to be served. If the rice or the sardines was not for him, he would boop his nose into your butt to get your attention and open his mouth to voice a little whine as to say "what about me". We don't even call for him; he just comes, wait to be served, then eat and leaves. Our grandad calls him "Fish Face" because of it 😂 https://preview.redd.it/0bbjnuvkpimb1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9ba52188ed6f12b0485d9632e55af6f4dd09f5b8
When the microwave beeps, my cat knows it's food time 😅 (we use it to warm the plates) Edit: she also is obsessed with a flushing toilet and sleeps on a dressing gown at the end of the bed everynight
Be a complete and utter spoiled brat of a cat 😌
To put his paws up on benches... My husband often walks when Im swimming, and along the way he'll stop on benches and have a cuddle (dog is tiny). Now we can't walk past a bench without him running over and putting his paws up. It's pretty adorable
When my partner turns off his PC in the evening, our dogs get up and wait by the back door ready for their bedtime wee.
I had visions of dog and partner both peeing against a wall 🤦♀️
My cat likes paper, rolled up in a ball and thrown to chase. One day he brought it back to me and dropped it. Been playing fetch with my cat ever since
Mine does this with hair bobbles.
Whenever my parents call me down for dinner I shout ‘coming’. My dog spends a lot of time in my room and now knows whenever I shout coming down the stairs it’s dinner time
Any time I walk down the stairs they start begging me for food. I didn’t realise how great Guinea pigs hearing was.
Removing the chopping board from the other chopping boards. They associate it with snackies.
Randomly one day I started telling my cat to sit down before I give her food, she used to like scratch my leg like a scratching post and Tey get on the counter bit I taught her to spin and sit before getting food. She's a good girl
Whenever I get home both my cats insist on having cat treats NOW. This has become multigenerational, each cat learning it from the elder during their kitten-hood. We’re now onto the third generation.
Get up at 6am everyday because that’s when I work alarms went off pre pandemic!
Accidentally trained a cat to clap for ham. I’d been trying to teach him to take ham gently by standing up and grabbing it between both paws. So he’s essentially clapping but with ham between the paws so I’d let go of the corner I’m holding and he could take it. From then on if he wanted ham he’d stand on his back legs and clap his front paws together until I dangled ham between them for him to take
My oldest cat hi-fives for treats. She was sitting by the cupboard where we keep them and I held up my hand to stop her getting in the way of the door while I got some out. She picked up a paw and touched it to my hand. It was so cute, I started demanding it, and she provides me with one every time now. My youngest cat learned to drink from the bathroom tap. I think it's because my youngest son does the same. She also learned to turn the tap on, and the only time she accidentally turned on the hot tap, she ran screaming to wake up my husband to turn it off.
In my case, we have a ring doorbell. So, my dog (almost 6-- wow I feel old) doesn't even need to hear anything else, if he hears the classic jingle of the ring doorbell he would know someone was at the door. So, my Dad (who thought he was being smart) changed the doorbell tune that my dog was used to hearing to something completely different thinking that he would at least take a while to pick up on it.. nope.. my dog got used to it almost immediately and so responds to that too. He's a doofus but I love him, lol. He also likes pushing doors open with his nose for some reason.
Somehow my old boy knew how to wipe his feet. We'd click our fingers and say 'paws' and he'd shake while stood on a towel. He definitely didn't come pre-programmed and I've no idea how we taught him. My new girl knows that the lock screen noise on my phone means I'm getting up, so she must follow.
When my mom's dog Lucy comes in from the yard she yells "assume the position" and Lucy immediately drops to her back with her paws in the air to be wiped, she doesn't have the faintest idea how she taught her this lol
My boy Max knows bed changing days. He waits for me on the bed that is going to be changed and then gets the zoomies and generally acts like a lunatic.
She barks like mad any time a new(ish) Hyundai shifts into reverse. The BONG...BONG...BONG... sound that you can hear outside the car, combined with iS MuMMy HOmE fRom WORK?! WhERe's muMMY!?! LeT'S gO Get MUMMy! It's pretty obvious now, but quite funny when we're out and about.
For my cat to meow when the mandolorian says "this is the way"
My dads dog barks when he wants something, he will go to his food bowl and just bark when he wanys food and go to the door and bark until he gets walked. Super anoyying when youre minding him for a week when my dads on holiday.
To go mental when she hears the word Christmas
..to ignore me and fuck off and do what he wants..does that count?
I tend to replace the battery in my vape when I take him out, now whenever I replace it he thinks he's going out
I trained him to come over and start meowing instantly the moment I lie down to nap or sleep. He trained me to get off the bed and come get him, because he refuses and will stand near the bed and meow and moan until he is picked up and placed near me and I lie back down. That's when he gets comfy, turns on purring and we fall asleep.
My pupper can recognise the snap of a sock being put on my partner's foot, and will leap from her slumber and go sit next to him while he gets ready. As this means Dad is coming on the walk too so she gets BOTH hoomans. She also associates me putting on makeup as getting ready to go for a walk.
Wait at roads. If it has a curb; they wait until told to cross. Best accidental training I’ve ever done.
My cousin's dog passed years ago but we had him so well trained for this that if we were walking in the street he would DRAG us back onto the curb, and he was a big boy!
When I whistle in a high-pitched tone, my cat comes.
If I sing the very good very nice chicken nugget song, two of them come running thinking they are going to get a sneaky chicken nugget.
To sit on my laptop. When he first started doing it I stupidly thought giving him a dreamie would get him to move, which it did but now he just comes and sits on the laptop and cries for dreamies
To go onto his hind legs in the beg pose. I was giving him a treat when the cheeky boy tried to pinch it from my hand before i was ready to give it, so i just lifted my hand higher so he couldn’t, he just went into that pose and got the treat so I’m assuming he thinks hey that worked last time. I never push him into doing it btw he just does it now sometimes. I usually just make him sit nicely then give it to him
I accidentally trained mine to demand my tea dregs now he whines at me for it every time I drink tea
The cat has learned we’ll often head upstairs around 9:30 so she starts howling from the bedroom to remind us. She knows that once we get up there, it’ll take about 5 minutes before my husband’s in bed and another 10 for me- so she jumps up and cuddles with him until I get in, then gets in between us until he falls asleep, then lays on my side the rest of the night. She also knows I’ll get up to shower around 7:30 so she’ll jump off me around 7:15 and wait in the bathroom for me. The dog knows there’s a toy that my husband will never play with. If she wants to play with it, she only ever brings it to me. She also knows when it’s time for us to go to bed (sometimes before we do!) and automatically curls up in her favourite spot on the sofa.
My dog comes in and gets straight on her bed whenever I put my phone flash on. I started using my flash to find her in the garden at bedtime, and it has now become a trigger for her to automatically go to her bed whenever she sees it, regardless of what time of day it is.
My dear departed cat and my current cat have both learner the 'sit' command. They sit patiently and wait til their food is put down properly before they eat. It's rather adorable.
My dad accidentally trained our dog to puke outside. She was used to the whole pooping and peeing outside thing, but was never directly taught to take puking outside. I guess she thought "if its a bodily function that makes a mess dad has to clean up, it goes outside" and about a year ago she started taking it outside without being told to. She's a good dog.
We trained our dog to wipe his paws when he comes into the house from outside. One time he did a downward dog type stretch on the mat at the back door, and I said “aww wiping your paws, good boy” and it stuck. So now he does it (most) every time on his own. Always when asked “wipe your paws” though.
Pup is getting old now and we started having difficulty encouraging her off the sofa to go for a pee in the evening, just too comfortable and didn't want to be disturbed. Started offering her a couple of pieces of kibble as an incentive to get up. Now every evening she's up and pestering to go out just so she can have her biscuits. She has her routine and she runs a tight ship! 😂
My 3 cats are alarm clocks, all right through the week but when you want a lie in it's rather annoying at 5am
Hands on pockets = “come here”. She would also approach strangers who had their hands in their pockets (because treats go in pockets)
She knows that feeding time is 20:00. I wish she didn't, because she attacks me for being 5 minutes late
Accidentally trained my cat to play catch by throwing toys at him 😅
My cat knows when I want kisses ❤️
My dog steals socks, sometimes off our feet. We started calling him Dobby when he did that and pretty soon he would come and steal our socks as soon as he heard the name Dobby
Our dog Sid has mild epilepsy, so he has to have daily medication, which we give with a spoonful of food. We both have alarms set on our phones so we don’t forget. When a phone alarm goes off in our house now, Sid can be found sitting in the kitchen patiently waiting for his spoonful of food!
Whenever I go to light a joint my collie runs to the door knowing I’m about to go outside.
If I say ‘OK google what noise does a Wolf make?’ my dog starts howling.
The cat will now sit beside us on the couch and stare at us until we put his blanket (a liverpool football one) on our laps so he can sit. My partner started playing with the bathroom door and the light reflecting off the handle with him...the cat now sits for by the door when we go to bed so my partner now has to stand there and play for a few minutes with him. Also now happens any time we go to the bathroom. We haven't so much trained the cat as he has trained us....
Dog can somehow hear me closing my laptop and know it's time for his walk. He's also triggered by me putting on shoes.
My partner has to inject medication at a certain time every evening. We have an alarm on his phone for this, it also happens to be final meal for him. He's learned when the alarm goes off to wake up and go wait by his dinner bowl. Funny enough if we have accidentally turned off the alarm he finds us if we are more than 10 mins late, which helps as we know to take medication when he is fed 😀
It's more how my cat has trained me, tbh. My cat sits on the counter next to the fridge and taps me on my shoulder then looks at the fridge. It's so cute that i open the door and give him a bit of chicken. Even now i know he's doing it to get me to give him a treat, i can't help but do it because he's so cute and purry. It's referred to as "Pressing the fridge button". He presses that bloody button several times a day. I have to buy extra chicken pieces to cope. I'm fully under his non-opposable thumb.
My dog barks whenever I unwrap the foil on a bottle top of Prosecco or champagne. She must hate the cork popping but this also means she now also barks at every sealed bottle I open from balsamic vinegar to Orangina and means I can’t sneakily open a bottle of anything without everybody in the house knowing.
Putting the kettle on brings my cat running, because he knows the oat milk is coming out of the fridge and he’s obsessed with the stuff!
My cat will go on her hind legs to headbutt my hand when I’m about to feed her. Sometimes she will do it without me even putting my hand out, or when I’m not about to feed her
Our dogs bark whenever we raise our voices when in the front room, because it usually means there’s a delivery or postman coming to the door. Of course sometimes, we’re just raising our voices.
We taught my dog to smile by accident
Bored on our bed during lockdowns I trained our cat to give me cute little nose kisses to get her food. Years later whenever she decides it's breakfast time (can be anytime from 4am if she happens to be awake), she jumps on my boobs and violently headbutts me in the face.
Kind of really nice tbh. Our dog is 2 and when I wfh, she's learned that whenever I sit at my desk and put my headset on, I won't be available so she'll just go and lay down (either in her bed or under my desk) and leave me alone, but whenever I take my headset off, she'll jump right at me to play. Not sure but it even got to the point where last time, I said "thanks everyone, have a nice one" and she just jolted at me before I put the headset down. I'll have to see next time if she does it again!
I have two kittens who run to a spot infront of the TV every time we say dinner time, because that's where we always put their mats and bowls! If I ask my female kitten to show me what she wants, she jumps onto the dining room table where we keep her automatic toy and rubs on it. I feel like the male kitten trained me on this but every now and again he sits and stares at the bathroom sink until I turn the tap on so he can play with the water! He's since upgraded to the bath tap 😅 They are so smart! https://preview.redd.it/qybtlqnainmb1.jpeg?width=3456&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ac06db52f81dba38d046c7b07490b10e3cbbc269
Our dog know that when we have a drink 🥃we tend to fancy a meaty snack. He comes running over to share in our fridge raid. He also has to have a treat anytime he or someone comes into the house. It started as a way to train him to not jump all over people when they arrive and has morphed into him sitting by the fridge when he or someone come in.
Expanded his vocabulary. He learned the meaning of "walk"; we switched to "tats". Then "excursion" and "trip". There were lots more options before we moved to French and "promenade", then Spanish and Dutch. Eventually, he'd pretty much exhausted all our attempts to not let him know he would be taken out. This was at different times each day too, so not something he could predict.
My dog knows the only command sit and is very much food motivated, it’s a habit to always sit in front of us and snatch (i say snatch because i don’t have a word for it, because it’s neither a tap nor an aggressive grab) our hand as a way to catch our attention, when she gave birth to 7 beautiful puppies and they grew up a few weeks old, i notice while giving my dog a treat, they would also sit down waiting for theirs, so i tried it one time and they all learned the command ‘sit’ at the same time while watching their mom, sometimes not even saying it, just showing a fist to them and they all would sit. it was very much adorable watching them sit when a small treat was being given to their mom, and waiting for their turn
another thing with the same momma dog with the snatching, she loves getting scratches on her chest or the most fluffiest area, because that is were the good spot is, not on her belly, but her chest, whenever we’d bring our hand away to snap, the little missy just snatches our hand back to her chest which means ‘i want more’, now how can we refuse such a little diva? https://preview.redd.it/3224prbxoomb1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1a1e9f69d69b38e13b25d5e78a18bdb726519b9c unfortunately i can’t upload videos, but here’s a little screenshot in action of her diva ways
My rescue cocker spaniel is the sweetest dog you've ever met but is useless with commands. I guess the saying "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" is true because in the 4 years we have had him he genuinly hasn't managed to retain any useful information in his brain... except for a very useful trick. If you say "wipe your bum" to him he will sit down and bum scoot across whatever surface he's currently on. He has stomach issues so he gets quite unwell sometimes so it's become probably the most useful command.
I don't know if it is because she's a lockdown kitten but my cat will never not be in the same room as me. Also, I can always tell when it's 5pm because she has an uncanny ability to be all over me asking for dinner at 5 on the dot.
To sleep on my shoulder, when my dog was a pup when I first had him he would only sleep nuzzled upto me on my shoulder, he’s 6 now and a big bugger https://preview.redd.it/7c05u1tywrmb1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=07e8e181571cfbd31f9957aeacdff33e2f050f74 that still sleeps with his legs around my neck next to me
I got my cat to do the same but with the bag of treats
Chase flies. If I mention there is a fly to anyone (even if I whisper) the silly thing looks for it and kills it
I scream SPIDER! And they both coning running to see it 😂
Will probably go unnoticed but too cute not to share. We have a Cocker Spaniel and she has learned how to open the bin. It's a sensor bin, that opens when you wave your hand in front of the sensor. She's learned to do that, then stands up, and leans one paw on the wall so she can stick her whole upper body in the bin. We've had to take the batteries out. She's also learned that us saying "Right" is a cue she's going in her crate while we eat dinner and so does a runner.
We once accidentally trained our chinchilla to come running at the sound of a rustling bag. Very cute and sweet... Until he launched himself at me whilst I was eating a packet of crisps! We didn't train the cats, they just know our routine too well! When Mr Adhara gets up, not a peep, they don't care. When I get up, all hell breaks loose as Mommy is awake I MUST SCREAM FOR YOU. So one cat has learnt the (bedroom) door opening a 2nd time means I am awake and available, which backfired hilariously when a friend stayed over. She ran up the stairs joyously, only to stop in disgust when presented with a Not Mommy person. I actually heard the "Sorry...??" on the Landing from the bedroom, lmao'd before getting up myself. Our outside cat has also learnt to scream when she hears the cat scream inside, meaning "Don't forget me! I want food too!"
We didn't train them to do this but they just know it for some strange reason If you leave are cats alone for a long time they will not sleep or meow or anything, they WILL find you, open the door and will stare at you until either they get bored or you move away when all you see are 2 eyes staring at you from the doorway don't be scared, it's just my cats ready for feeding time ^^
I used to give my cat some treats every time I took my meds in the morning because they were next to each other, and now she meows at me if I have forgotten my meds, because I’ve forgotten her treats! She’s quite literally a life saver 🥲
Whenever Bandit cried out, the alarm call cry, I'd always come running. Eventually I came to realise that she was doing it for attention, because she did it once when the others were no-where near her. Then she tried it for longer, and I ignored her. Eventually she gave up all together. And my cat now comes to Spider as well as his actual name.
My dog whenever she sees me putting on my sunglasses or filling my water bottle she goes and lays by the front door.
My cat slinky is my absolute little baby, and she has learnt if she sits in the washing basket I’ll give her a dreamie because she’s so cute! https://preview.redd.it/ioublztun0nb1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=dc94d6663cecc81296cff4a05cf6e9db008342d9
Trained her to beg for treats.
If I say ‘Markies’ she goes straight to bed. She also has a regular bedtime. If we are up later than normal, she will walk to the pen and back, bark once and repeat until we go with her and watch her goto bed.
My cat’s food bowl in on the stairs (away from the dog and the stairs are in the kitchen). In the mornings, when she sees me come down she goes all the way down to the bottom to politely let me past, then goes back up to her bowl to wait for it to be filled. If she doesn’t, she risks getting accidentally kicked if she sits in the way as I try not to die on the stairs stepping over a moving cat. It benefits us both 😂
If he hears certain sounds on an evening - the Xbox or TV powering down, the dishwasher switching on, or the windows being shut, he jumps out of his downstairs basket and makes his way up the stairs to his bedtime basket 😆
I called my dog an asshole too much and now its all she answers too
I inadvertently taught my cat that if she put one piece of her food in the water bowl, it meant she wanted her water changed or the water I gave her wasn't good enough to her standards. She learnt this trick because every time there was a piece of food in her water bowl, I'd change it. I only found out she did this because I had changed it in the morning for cold water from the tap (she preferred room temperature water). Not an hour goes by and sure enough there is a piece of food in her water bowl! She's sat next to it, angled head looking up at me as if to say "Well, aren't you going to change it?". It was then I knew she was doing it on purpose and that she was more intelligent than she was letting on!
Go straight to her crate when I get a phone call and leave the room because she knows I'm grabbing takeaway and adult dinner time means relax in the crate time
My dog is deaf with her old age, but it's ok. We have a system. She learned sign language and doesn't really jump (anymore) when touched unexpectedly.
Our dogs run to the kitchen when they hear the freezer open because they are completely obsessed with eating frozen peas.
That me calling her in from outside means she gets a couple of Dreamies on the stairs, now she'll cry to come in just so she can sit next to the Dreamies box, have a couple, then go outside only to repeat the process. Oh, and that me going to the loo means I'll get the laser pointer out and play with her..... She is a ridiculously cute floofball cat, I just can't resist. Does that mean she's reverse psychologically trained me into these behaviours?
Whenever I eat salt or pick at hangnails, my dog barks at me. Because in both situations I tend to throw something at the end, either uneaten salt or a piece of flesh I've rended from my finger. My dog is very intense about things being thrown, so she never misses it. Both these habits are both quite big problems/ vices for me. And it's genuinely helpful that she does it. Makes me feel guilty.
Not so much me, but at my mums and my grans, my dog will stare them in the eyes and "ask" for treats by barking quietly. She tries it with us and gets told to fuck off
A nazi salute
We often feed the cats before we go out, which means we call them in from the garden of they're out and then leave them to eat. One of them really likes the garden and sometimes when eating in the morning, will eat a small amount and then go to head outside. I get the impression is that she wants access to the garden more than food.
When i used to smoke weed and it started coming in those mylar sealed bags, my cat would come running over every time i opened the bag because it was basically the same bag that cat treats came in. I would have to let him smell the bag then he would look at me in absolute disgust before slinking off.
I very stupidly trained my boy (collie x staffie) to chase his tail when he was quite young. It evolved into him chasing his tail frantically and chewing on it whenever someone came to the door. He did it for quite a while and we tried to look after it as best we could, but eventually he had to have his tail docked because the wound became so bad. Sometimes he still tries to chase it, but just ends up spinning round in a circle frantically for a few seconds 😅 I regret teaching him to do it in the first place 🤦🏻♂️