When my black-and-tan Cavalier, Twyla, is happy or excited, she
twirls on her hind legs. When she wants a treat, she looks at
me, then at the cookie jar, then back at me. When she wants to
go out, she heads downstairs and sits in front of the door. And
there’s never any doubt that she’d like a belly rub. Despite her
lack of words, she’s a great communicator. Wouldn’t it be
wonderful if we could talk, like Dr. Doolittle, to the animals?
Of course it would, but take heart: We actually can talk with
them, in a manner of speaking. Human vocabulary may elude our
pets, but they all communicate in consistent ways. By learning
to read their tails, ears, fur and vocalizations, we can become
fluent in such foreign tongues as Siamese and Persian, Pekingese
and Bernese. Look at tail wags. In a study with the less-than-
riveting title “Asymmetric tail-wagging responses by dogs to
different emotive stimuli,” Italian scientists observed that
dogs’ tails wag more to the right when they feel positive about
a person or situatio