Awesome Animals

Want to know what your mutt’s actual breeds are? Mars Veterinary sells identification kits that will help you determine your dog’s ancestry using a painless and easy to use swab kit. They also sell kits to verify purebreds.

Every domesticated animal we’ve ever know runs for the hills or freaks out when the vacuum cleaner goes on. Not so for this orange tabby, who not only isn’t scared of the appliance, he thinks it’s a delectable treat. Weirdo.

BBC’s Earth Unplugged films a golden eagle named Tilly to learn the functions of her various feathers. Worth watching just to see her chilling stare. Now imagine if this video wasn’t staged.

Another hilarious single purpose Tumblr blog features only images of athletes playing their sports – with the balls replaced digitally with cats. Yes, folks, this is what the Internet was made for.

Suki the cat is just 8 months old, but YouTuber MiGoArCHiMi already managed to teach her a lot of agility tricks and other neat commands. Soon she might be good enough to compete in dog shows.

While it’s more likely that it was just the sound of this man’s voice that made all of these turtles go scurrying into the water, it’s definitely more amusing to think that they actually understood what he was saying.

The staff of Sedgwick County Zoo caught this silly standoff between one of the zoo’s gorillas and a goose that had wandered into the primate’s den. Cue bongos… BIRD VERSUS MONKEEEEY!

This cat possesses only a single move, but it’s enough for him to escape just about any situation you can throw at him. We like to refer to it as the “Do a Barrel Roll” ninpo.

Cats have not been known to recognize their reflection in a mirror, but Sox here seems to be an exception. She seems to be working on her miming skills. She’s even got the fur for the job.

We’ve seen a guy play Dueling Banjos by himself, and we’ve seen dogs eat their dinner like humans. Well this is the Internet folks, where every permutation of everything eventually surfaces. Enjoy.

Ronan the sea lion demonstrates an unusual talent not common outside of humans and the occasional bird. The marine biologists at UC Santa Cruz trained her to dance to rhythms. Though her taste in music is questionable.

You’ll believe a dog can fly (and skateboard and surf) after you watch this rapid-fire stunt reel showcasing 20 of Jumpy the border collie’s amazing feats of agility, balance, speed and general dog smarts.

Watch in awe – uhm, we mean awwwwww – as this racoon plays his favorite string instrument, the sprinkler harp. We’d be more impressed if he could play the The Walking Dead theme, though.

ZeFrank is at it again, this time in association with BBC’s Earth Unplugged. Watch and learn fascinating (and rather amusing) factoids about one ugly bugger, the naked mole rat.

YouTuber aws0607 caught this adult panda wrestling with her younger friend and refusing to let the cub go. We’re pretty sure she caught the little one in a piledriver at one point. The fun continues here.

We see this feline is smarter than the average cat, what with this dogwalking task she’s taken on. What we really want to know is if she cleans up after her canine friend too. (Thanks Aaron!)

(NSFW: Language, Gore) A couple of guys were filming a dead cow – don’t ask us why – when more cows arrive to check them out. One cow was either more furious or curious than the others.

Lest you think that goats and cats are the only animals capable of human-sounding utterances, here’s an antelope with something to tell you. Actually, it’s more of a question.

YouTuber jamuomii’s high jumping cat has moved on from snatching stationery targets and is now training to be a goalkeeper. How awesome would it be if soccer pros adopted her goalie stance?

YouTuber HydRemote recorded this young fella’s struggle to take a ride on his old windsurf board. This was cut down from a 30-minute video, so let’s give the pup some props for perseverance.

Over a decade ago, marine biologist Roger Hanlon stumbled onto an octopus as it transformed to match its surroundings, leading him to study how cephalopods morph in color, shape and texture.

Wildlife photographer John Downer was kind enough to share this cute and hilarious footage from the BBC/Discover program Penguins – Spy in the Huddle. The snowball cam is pretty classic too.

We’ve already seen plenty of goats yelling like humans, so the guys at Olde Payphone figured it was time for humans to start yelling like goats yelling like humans. Sorry, no beatboxing here.