Posted on 11/25/2018 12:51:40 PM PST by SJackson
We will rank five barnyard residents, starting at the bottom, and work our way to the top.
You just cannot find a dumber barnyard creature than a sheep. Yes, they supply us with wool for clothing, but so does a cotton plant. Yes, some people do enjoy mutton, but steak, veal, ham, bacon, chicken, and turkey make for some really good eating.
My wife and I watched sheep being herded by Border Collie dogs in New Zealand. Those sheep would just cower at the sight of a dog that was one-tenth its size. It is in their genetic makeup to band together for protection against any predators. But if those sheep were smart, they would turn on that dog and chase it over the next hill.
When one sheep moves, the others tend to follow. Recently a lone sheep in Turkey tried to jump across a 15-foot ravine. Over 400 sheep followed, all falling to their deaths.
We had a ram, a male sheep, on our Oak Grove Ridge farm in the hill country of Crawford County, Wisconsin, in the 1940s and 1950s. His sole job was to impregnate 25 ewes each year. Not a bad gig for a male sheep! My brothers and I would tease Sheepbuck by holding out a handful of grain, succulent morsels of ground corn. Sheepbuck would slowly approach and take a few nibbles. Then we would push back on Sheepbuck’s forehead, making him madder than Hades. Off we would run for the safety of the barnyard feeding bunks. You would think Sheepbuck would learn. But no, he didn’t, and that is why sheep are the stupidest animal on the farm. My final example: The first animal to die in George Orwell’s Animal Farm was a sheep, in the Battle of Cowshed.
Chickens have the IQ of a 2-year-old, maybe a 3-year-old, but that would be pushing it. Chicken lovers will brag that chickens, like dogs and cats, have distinct personalities, some being a bit shy and others out-going and gregarious. But who can love an animal that scratches the ground, picks out seeds, ticks, worms, and is prone to carrying lice?
We all find cows irresistible. They have the most beautiful eyes, especially Brown Swiss and Jerseys. Cows have a social pecking order, and Charlotte was the prima donna on the Scheckel farm. Woe be it to any cow that tried to cut in line to get into the barn before Charlotte. Cows form friendships, graze together in herds, and are generally non-complaining servants. Cows are prone to bloating if allowed in a really luscious field of green alfalfa or clover. It’s a shame to see a dead cow, prone with all four legs straight out. We’ll put them right in the middle of our hierarchy of barnyard animal intelligence.
We’re moving up the ranking of the smartest farm animals. In second place is the horse. Horses are hard workers, easy to train, and loyal to a fault. They can remember and respond to dozens of words or commands. Roy Rogers had Trigger, Gene Autry rode Champion, the Lone Ranger owned Silver, and Hopalong Cassidy went after the bad guys astride Topper. Each displayed an impressive array of tricks, stunts, and movements.
Now we come to the very smartest of all farm animals, and that highest honor is reserved for the pig. You heard me, the pig! Piglets are the cuddliest of all barnyard creatures, what with their soft pink noses and delicate ears. Pigs can be housebroken, same as a dog. Ever try to housebreak a calf or lamb? And pigs can be trained to walk on a leash.
Pigs can figure out how to open gates, and have been taught to use a joystick to play video games and move a cursor on a video screen. Pigs have been called mud-wallowers. That’s because they have no sweat glands, and they like to wallow in mud to stay cool. Their skin is prone to sunburn, so mud is their sunblock.
Sadly for the pig, we humans harvest pig’s eye corneas for transplant. A pig’s heart valve is identical to the human heart valve. Pigs have given up, without a squeal, their own heart valve to replace failing human hearts. Pig glands have been used to make insulin. Pig skin has been collected for burn patients. As a point of information, footballs are made of cowhide, not pigskin, and all the pigs out there have just given a big collective sigh of relief!
So there you have it. The smartest farm animals, in order, from top to bottom, goes like this: pig, horse, cow, chicken, and sheep. That’s my line up, and I’m sticking to it.
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“But who can love an animal that scratches the ground, picks out seeds, ticks...”
I’m gonna adore any critter that knocks out Lyme disease, possums included.
You could have used turkey and had one for the bottom right from the start. Missed an opportunity, there.
rwood
This guy has never raised turkeys - hands down the dumbest animal on a farm.
You left out that pigs make for some really fine eating.
Chops, roasts, bacon, BBQ, rinds, the list goes on.
“This is the greatest barbecue I’ve ever tasted! That pig must have been a genius!”
A horse in unquestionably the dumbest animal in the pasture. They can find a way to get out of the fence, but will never figure out how to get back in. They spook at a moving shadow. A moose will scare them to death. They get their heads tangled up in barbed wire. There’s a whole array of just stupid things they do.
A cow will remember where the hole in the fence is so they can get back home. And they just don’t do the dumb things a horse does.
pig, horse, cow, chicken, sheep and then turkey.
Sheep don’t look up into the rain, mouths agape, and drown!
Baaaaad analysis. You never saw the game piece...I TOOK A LICKIN’ FROM A CHICKEN? Google it.
Do Tide pods or chug a lug parties indicate humans are as stupid as sheep?
Pigs are smart, but goats are evil geniuses.
Even in the Equine class horse is at the bottom of the list, ponies, mules and donkeys are all much smarter. Smartest one I ever ran across was a pony/donkey cross. Sturdy and smart with a gate like a jackhammer. As a pack animal though she would walk any other animal into the ground and then dance pass their prone bodies saying "Nah, Nah, Nah you sissies!"
Now goat is ahead of cow though. Little trouble makers.
So pig, goat, cow, horse, duck, chicken, sheep. Just my opinion, your millage may vary.
Uhhhh, sorry Larry Scheckel cotton plants do NOT supply wool.
If you blow your credibility in the first 3-4 sentences, why should we pay attention to any more of your waste of good bandwidth?
And that is why the God likens us to sheep.
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As farmers, we always did the gate test to determine farm animal intelligence.The heifers and cows, et alii, would be in the pasture with a loop-lock gate, just a rope on a nob. Lift the rope and you are out, The cows failed miserably, not a one. The pig could open and reloop it/ The horse, an Arabian, always lifted the loop with his mouth. Ditto for the goat. The chicken was too small but there is a video on utube showing a chicken opening a door. There is also a video on same showing 3 women who failed the swing-do-not lift gate test.
Thus the gate ranking is:
1. pig
2. Horse
3. goat
4. chicken
5. cow
6. woman
7. goose
Big man, pig man
Ha, ha, charade you are
That’s barely touching the subject. There’s many more farm animals.
“Pig, horse, cow, chicken, and sheep. That’s my line up, and I’m sticking to it.”
Bravissimo. Sounds good. I like the line-up of smart insects from Cal Berkeley about ten years ago. If the three finalists are ants, bees and butterflies, the winner goes to the butterfly, the smartest insect by far. Funny how the researches tested the insects with color games and smell games.
Pets you can eat!
Although actually a farm pest, I’d put the crow as the smartest.
A crow was recently observed trying to get a grub our of a rotting log. After a few unsuccessful minutes, the crow flew away and returned with a piece of wire. He then held the wire down with his feet and used his beak to bend and fashion a hook. He then used the hook to pull bugs and grubs out of the log.
I don’t ever remember reading about any other animal actually modifying something to make a more efficient tool.
As annoying as crows can be at 5:30 AM if you have a bunch near your house having a loud, er...”discussion”, it is hard not to admire them. They are very interesting creatures. My favorite story was related by a hunter:
Every year when he went deer hunting on his property, the crows would silently follow him around, making no noise, waiting until he bagged a deer and removed the gut-pack, after which they would swoop in for the feast. That part didn’t surprise him, he figured they knew a good thing when they saw it.
What he didn’t understand is how they seemed to know the exact day the hunting season would begin. When he would come out of his back door, ready to go, the crows were ready to go as well, sitting everywhere getting ready to follow him.
What the Hell...could crows read signs or calendars??? Then he realized one year, that they figured it out by watching him through his windows. As soon as he started pulling out all of his hunting gear, putting it on his dining room table, waterproofing his boots, cleaning his gun and such, the word got out in the crow world: He’s almost ready to go...be prepared to follow!
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