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We use word buzzers with our German Shepherd mix. He now has a vocabulary of about 40 word buzzers (and would have more if I could do a better job of keeping up with making them), but earlier on, when we didn’t have quite as many, he showed us how smart he was…

We live on the 3rd floor and noticed that the top of his crate was flush with the windowsill in our bedroom, so I put a dog bed on top of his crate with a ramp so he could get up there himself. But at the beginning, he was a little wary of the ramp, so I would lift him up there, where he enjoyed surveying the neighborhood.

We have a dog bed in the livingroom, and had a “bed” buzzer for him to reference it. We called the dog bed “bunkbed” so that he wouldn’t be confused when we would reference one or the other, but at this point, I hadn’t made a “bunkbed” buzzer yet.

A couple of weeks later, he pushed “outside” + “bed.” “Outside” meant that he wanted to go outside for a walk, or out on the deck to sun himself (now we have a separate “deck” buzzer). I said, “Buddy, we don’t have a bed outside, I’m sorry.”

The next day, he pushed “outside” + “bed” again, and again, I said, “I don’t know what you want, I’m sorry.”

The following day he pushed “outside” + “bed” again and my husband realized, “I think he wants to go on the bunkbed.” So I asked, “Do you want to go on the bunkbed?” and he perked up and started going towards the bedroom, then paused, waiting for me to go with (to lift him up). So apparently, for him, the bunkbed was the bed where he could look outside.

We now have a separate buzzer for “bunkbed” and he climbs up there by himself.

He has also put together “ice” + “food” for dog ice cream cups.

We have a whole bunch of these kinds of instances. He’s very smart (and sometimes demanding) with his requests!