The Smartest Animals in History: 8 Real Animals Who Amazed Scientists

Which are the smartest animals in history? Not species, but real, named animals who surprised the scientists studying them. Here are eight of the smartest animals ever tested, from a dog with a 1,022-word vocabulary to a horse whose real talent turned out to be something nobody expected.

1. Chaser: The Dog Who Knew 1,022 Words

Chaser was a border collie trained by psychologist John Pilley in South Carolina. She learned the names of 1,022 toys and could fetch any of them on request. In 2011, a study by Pilley and Alliston Reid reported that she could even work out the name of a new toy by elimination. It is the largest tested memory for words in any non-human animal.

2. Alex: The Parrot Who Asked a Question

Alex was an African grey parrot studied for 30 years by Dr. Irene Pepperberg. He learned more than 100 words, could name colors and shapes and count to six. He is famous for asking what color he was. Read Alex the Parrot: He Asked What He Was.

3. Koko: The Gorilla Who Learned Sign Language

Koko, a western lowland gorilla, learned more than 1,000 signs and asked for a kitten she named All Ball. Scientists still debate how much of her signing was true language. See Koko the Gorilla.

4. Kanzi: The Bonobo Who Learned by Watching

Kanzi was a bonobo studied by primatologist Sue Savage-Rumbaugh. As a baby he watched researchers try to teach his adoptive mother to use a keyboard of symbols, and he picked it up himself. He went on to use hundreds of symbols and to respond to spoken English requests, which made him one of the most studied apes in the world.

5. Betty: The Crow Who Made a Hook

Betty was a New Caledonian crow at the University of Oxford. In a 2002 experiment, food sat in a little basket at the bottom of a tube, and Betty was given a straight piece of wire. She bent it into a hook and pulled the basket out. Scientists had rarely seen an animal shape a new tool for a problem like this.

6. Ayumu: The Chimp With a Photographic Memory

Ayumu is a chimpanzee at Kyoto University in Japan. In a 2007 study, he could glance at numbers flashed on a touchscreen for a fraction of a second, then tap them in order, beating university students at the task. Other researchers point out that Ayumu had far more practice than the students, so how much better his memory really is remains debated.

7. Snowball: The Cockatoo Who Dances to the Beat

Snowball is a sulphur-crested cockatoo who dances in time to music and changes his speed when the tempo changes. Studies of his dancing showed that animals other than humans can follow a musical beat. Read Snowball the Dancing Cockatoo.

8. Clever Hans: The Horse Who Fooled Berlin

In the early 1900s, a horse named Clever Hans seemed to solve sums by tapping his hoof, and crowds filled a Berlin courtyard to watch. A panel of experts found no trick in 1904. Then in 1907, psychologist Oskar Pfungst showed that Hans was right about 89 percent of the time when he could see a questioner who knew the answer, and only about 6 percent when he couldn't. Hans couldn't do math. He was reading tiny, unconscious changes in people's faces and posture. Scientists still call this the Clever Hans effect, and it is one reason experiments are run blind today.

What Is the Smartest Animal in History?

There is no single winner, because intelligence comes in different kinds. Chaser holds the record for words remembered, Betty showed real problem-solving, and Clever Hans showed a different talent: reading people better than they could read themselves.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the smartest animal in history?

There is no single answer, but Chaser the border collie is often named for her 1,022-toy vocabulary, and Alex the parrot and Koko the gorilla are among the most famous animals in language research.

What is the smartest dog breed?

Border collies are widely ranked first for working intelligence, including in psychologist Stanley Coren's well-known ranking. Chaser, a border collie, holds the record for remembering words.

Could Clever Hans really do math?

No. Tests in 1907 showed he was reading tiny, unconscious cues from the people around him. When the questioner didn't know the answer, Hans almost always got it wrong.

Related Stories

• Alex the Parrot: He Asked What He Was
• Koko the Gorilla: She Learned More Than 1,000 Signs
• Paul the Octopus: The Animal That Called the 2010 World Cup

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Sources

• Wikipedia: Chaser (dog): her 1,022 toy names and John Pilley's research
• Wikipedia: Kanzi: his symbol use and language studies
• Weir, Chappell and Kacelnik, Science (2002): Shaping of hooks in New Caledonian crows: Betty's hook
• Wikipedia: Ayumu (chimpanzee): the memory study and the debate about it
• Wikipedia: Clever Hans: the 1904 commission and Pfungst's 1907 tests

More true animal stories: From Paw to Tail Blog

Cover photo: Karl Krall via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.