Understanding nonverbal communication in animals

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I am absolutely better at communicating/reading body language with animals than people. I pick up on a lot of things everyone else misses. While I was training to be a veterinary technician, I would always notice things about the animals. If an animal was sick or injured, I would just watch it for a minute and could tell what was wrong, or where the illness came from, sometimes the vets didn't even see it. I guess I'm really good at putting together little bits of information and seeing a pattern. And once I was watching The Dog Whisperer and there was this dog with behavior problems. In about ten seconds of showing the dog I could tell it was blind. I can't remember if the people on the show ever figured it out. I kept yelling at the TV, "Come on, the dog is blind! How do they not see it???"

"Then I sneak your taco, because you can't see me..." *sneak* *sneak* "I'm a stealthy invisible ninja" "Invisibility cloak, engage"

Then he'd stick his paw up to my plate and I'd yell at him, "I CAN STILL SEE YOU!"

I do understand non verbal communication in animals and depending on how much focus I can give at that moment usually have direct dialogue with the animal.

It's very humbling when the animal intiates the communication........they know us humans sooo well/they can read us/ body language and original thought + intent very quickly too.

i have a family of 8 kookaburras that live in my yard. they are always nearby.
when it is their feeding time at 7pm(just before dusk) they all fly down and land on the railing of my back verandah.
i talk to them in a special voice i could never repeat for a human.
it is a silly cartoony voice, but i know it stimulates them because they all look at me intently and cutely while i do the voice. i have a different voice for every kookie, and i recognize each of them distinctly. i can pet them although birds are not really happy about being petted because their quills on the end of their feathers transmit an unpleasant sensation to them when they are touched.

but they certainly do want me to talk to them each individually. if i do not talk in my special way to a certain kookie, it will be confused as to whether to take the strip of meat from my fingers. as soon as i talk in it's special way, it becomes so content and gobbles up my offering of meat.

i love my kookaburras that live in my yard and they love me i can see from their sparkling little eyes that look at me.

at night i have marsupial possums who come here. there are 3 girls and 2 boys. one boy is al old possum,and is tha father of the other male possum.
male possums have a reddish coat anfd they are very easily tameable.
they like to be petted, and i search my 2 males for ticks every night. they love me scratching gently through their coats as i feel for ticks.
when i find one, i pull it off, and sometimes i have to pull hard, but the possum realizes that i am relieving it of an unriddable itch and lets me do it.

they trust me so much and i like them extremely. the girl possums like to be petted to but they are much more wary of things and they run off at any unexpected noise.

animals are so real and alive as much as any human.
it does not require intelligence to have consciousness, and so it is irrelevant how much intelligence a human has when considering how conscious they are compared to other animals.


sorry if this is ill worded as i am tired and i am going to press "submit" without checking the spelling or continuity.

b9 it was fine-I enjoyed reading it and I am frankly...jealous.

Once years ago I was catching a lift home from someone. He had his dog in the truck who I had never met before. The dog immediately put his head on my shoulder. Made me feel good.

HI Aimless!


"Chooks" = hens and roosters ( an Aussie term, I think also used in New Zealand so therefore an Antipodean term) I'm glad you got the visuals from my description.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxNg7ZP6E5E[/youtube]

here's another that's cute:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JynBEX_kg8[/youtube]

B9,

Thanks for describing your friendships with these animals.
Just so moving!

How rich are u!

Hey B9,

The last sentence should have read-
'How rich YOU are.'

The answer should be "yes". Autistics can read animals better than NTs because they have a lot of experience of manual decoding of nonverbal communication (from NTs), and more sense of details. It could also be that Autistics have more talent at reading animals because of inherited functions for decoding nonverbal communication in other species. This would make sense in conjunction with passive hunting traits (they are for instance better at mimicking animal sounds to lure a prey).