21 Times Animals Proved They Are Much Smarter Than We Think

Not only can animals follow human commands, but they can also show how smart they are. Knowing that their funny faces and tricks impress humans, some of them try to make us feel sentimental, while others invent tricky schemes to get what they want.

In one of their threads, Reddit users shared stories about what smart things their pets or other animals have done. Some of them are so impressive that we at Bright Side felt like retelling them to you.

• I made friends with a crow while smoking on the porch. I gave it fragments of whatever food I could find on the way out. One day, I found an empty pack of cigarettes on the porch. I was puzzled, but I threw it away. A few days later, I found my crow bro standing behind 3 empty packs of cigarettes. I tried to pick them to throw them away, but the crow bro was protecting them for some reason. I was frustrated, but I gave it a small chunk of meat as I took another drag. As I gave it the meat, the crow picked up one of the packs and placed it in front of me. Then, it hit me: the crow was trading with me. The trade went on for few more times until the winter hit Minnesota. © Asiansensationz
• My dog places one of her squeaky toys near a small hole between our fence and the neighbors. She then squeaks it and waits for the dog next door to approach in anticipation of retrieving the toy just so she can bark at him. © Bl00d_0range

• We used to have 2 kittens. One day at the dinner table one of them stood up and put 2 paws on my dad’s lap. We all laughed at her obvious attempt at trying to steal food. While our attention was focused on her, her sister jumped straight onto the table and stole a whole chicken drumstick. They both sprinted away and shared it nearby. We were all impressed. © FindingAlaska

• I have a Senegal parrot and if I put a plastic bottle cap in his cage, he’ll put it in his beak, scoop it full of water out of his water dish, and then sit on his perch, hold it in one claw, and sip out of it like it’s a cup of coffee. I have no idea where he learned this! © Nickelbagn

• My Siamese cat once opened a cupboard in the kitchen and dragged a sealed bag of cat food into the living room for me to open because I’d forgotten to feed her. © MechaGuru

• I had a roommate who was a real bum to my dog. He would regularly walk by the dog and without warning, jump at him and yell. One day the dog was lying by the front door when my roommate came home. The dog got up, walked into the kitchen, and hid to the side of the doorway. He waited for my roommate to walk in and then jumped out from behind the door and barked at him, scaring my roommate to death. Good boy. (P.S. My roommate moved out soon afterward). © raptorbluez

• A chimp at a zoo was clapping like the star of the show and when we would start clapping he would dance for us. He was hyping us up. © greatrater

• A few years ago, there were a few slices of bread in the middle of the street for whatever reason. A few crows kept flying down and treating themselves, but whenever they did, one of the neighborhood dogs would come out and chase them off. The crows tried about 3 times to eat in peace, but the dog chased them off every time. So the crows then decided to land a little bit further away from the slices of bread and the dog ran toward them. The crows then flew off and landed about a meter away from where they had just landed. The dog followed them again. The crows repeated this until the dog was on a different street and then they came back and chowed down. © RotomGuy

• When I was a child, my friend and I were rounding up sheep with our fathers and their dogs. It was a hilly area and we were pushing them down a gully into the yards. One of the dogs took off over a hill and about 15 mins later it met us back near the yards with 15 extra sheep that we had missed.© bmsbluemountainstate

• It seems my cat is smarter than my husband. My hubby won’t let the cat sleep in bed with us because of the fur. The cat gets extremely disappointed by this. That’s why he waits till my husband falls asleep after work and comes to my side of the bed looking like the winner.

• I work in a company that does video surveillance systems. Generally, most animals and even doves cross the street at the green light, but humans still cross the street at red lights.
• I have a conure and he’s been trained to say, “go poop” whenever he has to poo so that we avoid him crapping on the couch. He also knows how to kiss and will say, “Hey Google” when he wants my attention because he knows it’s how I get Google’s attention. © birbbs
• Whenever I let my dog dictate the walk (the “go sniff” command, where I let her lead and give her the full extent of the leash), she will walk me to the local pet store 100% of the time. © _iPood_
• My husband and I moved to Australia from Serbia and got a cat named Muffin. Much to our disappointment we were not able to establish the right relationship with him for a long time until the moment when my husband said jokingly, “The cat is a local, which means he speaks English!” We checked this and voila! He almost instantly reacted to a couple of simple and kind words. Now our cat knows 2 languages and goes by his Serbian name too. My husband jokes that our cat is gonna to know more languages than he does.

• I have a golden retriever dog. He likes to swim a lot. We often go to the same beach and my fluffy friend has already remembered the way. When we are approaching the beach, he starts to jump inside the car, out of joy, anticipating the upcoming swimming. But if we swim together he always thinks that I am drowning. He always comes up to me, scratches me with his paws, and gives me his neck for support so that I can hold on to his collar. After that, he starts to pull me toward the shore.
• I have a Maine Coon and we lived in a ghetto apartment in Georgia. In the summertime it gets HOT. So my cat started jumping on top of the fridge and using his back foot to kick open the top of the freezer door, then he would jump down inside the freezer, and take cool naps. Clever little guy. ©musicals4life
• Once when I was feeding bread to ducks (I know, I know, this was a while back and we know better now), a heron came up to me, took some bread, threw it in the water, and grabbed the fish that came up to eat the bread. © Victorymm07

Have you encountered similar stories in your life? Which of them impressed you the most? We would be glad to hear from you in the comments!