Forget Herding Sheep...

Did you know that animal behaviourists in New Zealand are training dogs to drive cars? True, apparently; I saw some footage of it on the TV the other night. They had to adapt the controls, of course, since dogs aren’t quite the same shape as people. But there they sat, bolt upright in the driving seat, with one paw on the steering wheel and the other resting nonchalantly on the open window frame looking for all the world like good ol’ boys about to go cruising the blacktop.

The main problem they had was with the plastic thingie that holds the drinks cans. They had to have bigger ones made to accommodate a water bowl, since they haven’t yet discovered a way of training the dogs to steer with one paw while drinking a can of Coke with the other. And dare I point out that the male dogs were better at reversing into narrow spaces than the bitches? No, of course I daren’t.