Smell. Smell is a dog's most prominent sense and the one that is the most different from ours. It has been estimated that a dog's sense of smell is 100,000 times more powerful than a human's.
You may be surprised to find out that a dog's ability to taste is not all that great. In fact, their taste is probably their weakest sense. According to PetMD, humans have six times the amount of taste buds that dogs do.
Besides the sense of smell, the best canine sense is usually hearing. Dogs can hear sounds in much greater ranges - both pitch and volume, and are capable of hearing and pinpointing sounds at a much farther distance.
1. Bloodhound. With a record-breaking 300 million scent receptors, the Bloodhound is the gold medal-winner for sniffing out anything you may want to find. They've been used to find many things over the years - not least fleeing criminals - and can follow a scent trail on the ground or in the air.
Dogs have 100 million odor senses. The area of their brain dedicated to analyzing odors is 40 times larger than that of a human brain. Cats have 200 million odor senses.
Though this data might seem to suggest that dogs are twice as intelligent as cats, a direct correlation between larger brain size and increased intelligence has not been conclusively proven. Regardless, dogs' higher neuron count is often viewed as a gauge of their superior intelligence.
Dogs, it turns out, have about twice the number of neurons in their cerebral cortexes than what cats have, which suggests they could be about twice as intelligent.
Border collie
According to The Intelligence of Dogs, which ranks 131 dog breeds in terms of their relative intelligence, the border collie is the smartest dog breed known to man.
German Shepherd
Whether it's sniffing out bombs for the army or controlling crowds for the police, German Shepherds are the bravest of all the dog breeds. As a family pet they will happily put their life on the line to keep you safe.
Smell is a dog's most prominent sense and the one that is the most different from ours. It has been estimated that a dog's sense of smell is 100,000 times more powerful than a human's.
Key takeaway. Dogs sniff people's crotches because of the sweat glands, also known as apocrine glands, that are located there. Sniffing these glands gives a dog information about a person such as their age, sex, mood, and mating probability.
However, canines can figure out the gist of what we want and gather a lot of information from our body language, tone of voice, the rhythm of our voice and intonation of speech. What your dog hears when you talk to him is his favorite melody – your voice.
How far dogs can smell depends on many things, such as the wind and the type of scent. Under perfect conditions, they have been reported to smell objects or people as far as 20km away.
Areas to Avoid
The genitals and anus are obvious areas to stay away from; dogs are protective of these areas just like humans. In general, other areas to avoid petting include the face, tail, feet, and legs. Hugging a dog should also be avoided unless you are certain the dog likes it.
Citrus scents top the list of smells your dog probably hates. The scent of lemons, limes, oranges, and grapefruits is strong and unpleasant for your dog. For this reason, you can use citrus scents as a dog repellant in off-limits parts of the house.
Diseases. Improper air flow, affecting olfactory skills, could be caused by diseases such as nasal cavity tumors, local injuries, or specific infections such as canine distemper or parainfluenza.
Zeus, the King of Dogs.
Australian Cattle Dogs
Bluey, an Australian cattle dog, entered the Guinness Book of World Records by living to the ripe old age of 29 years and 5 months, setting the record for oldest dog ever.
According to several behavioral measures, Coren says dogs' mental abilities are close to a human child age 2 to 2.5 years. The intelligence of various types of dogs does differ and the dog's breed determines some of these differences, Coren says.
Zak studied 10 cats and 10 dogs to see how much affection they had for their humans, and it turns out dogs love their owners almost five times more than cats do, according to the Huffington Post.
Researchers examining the differences between "dog people" and "cat people" found that feline fans score higher on intelligence tests and are more introverted, open-minded, and sensitive, LiveScience reports.
Horses and Dogs are both intelligent animals, but they have different cognitive strengths. Horses excel in areas like navigational intelligence while dogs do better with social intelligence. Neither animal is smarter than the other, that's just what makes them unique!