Review: Compare with your own choices
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 06 26, 2014
Everyone has their own ideas about how intelligent certain animals are. Based on laboratory experiments, author Selena Dale has listed fifteen animals that she believes have demonstrated high orders of intelligence. As would be expected, most are mammals, but she nominated ants and one species of spider too. They're listed in no particular order, but most readers will probably have their own ideas about ranking. Problem solving and ability to work cooperatively with others of their species landed several animals on the list. Dogs and cats are listed, of course, and which is more intelligent has been the topic of many an argument over the centuries that they've been domesticated. A few fun facts:* Pigs have played video games that were too difficult for three-year-old children.* Humans and ants are the only creatures known to farm other animals. Ants farm colonies of aphids and consume their byproducts (I've seen this - we have ants farming citrus aphids on one of our shrubs.).* Some breeds of dogs, including Labrador retrievers, border collies, German shepherds, and poodles, are known for their high intelligence.My own choice: squirrels, which I've seen do incredible feats of problem solving to get to some food meant for birds.