[MUSIC PLAYING]
NARRATOR: Doctors believe this dog helped
diagnose her owner's cancer.
Can animals bring unknown powers to medicine?
How did Beetle the cat find his way
through city streets and country roads across southern England
to the home he loved?
What invisible lifeline links a man and this dog?
How did this Rottweiler foresee the heart attack which
would have killed her master?
Mysteries from the files of Arthur C. Clarke,
author of 2001 and inventor of the communication satellite.
Now in retreat in Sri Lanka, he ponders the riddles
of this and other the worlds.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
Come on.
I've always been fond of animals, which
is a good thing since it's impossible to avoid
them here in Sri Lanka.
Over the years I've had many animal companions, usually
dogs, but also a pair of mischievous monkeys
who did their best to take over my life.
All my pets have been lovable, but some have also surprised me
with their intelligence and their ability
to know what I'm thinking.
But can you make of claims that some animals
have extraordinary, even supernatural skills?
These include mathematical horses, dogs that can diagnose
illnesses, and domestic pets with the navigational
know how to track down their owners over miles
of unfamiliar countryside.
NARRATOR: Bonita Whitfield owes her life to her dog Boo.
She believes Boo alerted doctors to a disease
that threatened her life.
Now Boo has a place in medical history.
Her extraordinary story is chronicled in a world
famous doctors' journal.
Bonita Whitfield has lived to tell the tale.
Well, I used to standing at the sink.
And she'd come up behind me and start sniffing my leg.
And I used to shew her away because I thought
it was just a dog sniffing.
And this went on for about four or five months.
And then why day I was at the sink washing up
and I felt something on the back of my leg and put my hand down,
not realizing it was Boo, and I felt
a lump on the back of my leg.
That evening when I had a bath I had a look at it,
and it was a mole.
I've never had a mole there before.
And then one day I was out in the summer
and she actually went for the back to my leg
where this mole was.
And tried to nip it off.
And she did it again, tried to bite it off.
She's not a dog that snaps or bites.
And it was just so out of character.
But it still really didn't dawn on me
that there was anything wrong.
NARRATOR: But Bonita told a friend about the mole.
Her friend, a nurse, told her to see a doctor at once.
BONITA: She said, promise me you will go to the doctor's.
So I went to doctor's.
And he sent me along to King's College.
And they inspected it.
They took it off.
They do a biopsy on it.
And found that it was a melanoma.
Dr. Hywel Williams, who was treating me at Kings
said that another year and it would have
started to spread in the body.
So I was very lucky.
But I still didn't put the two together,
the dog and the melanoma.
NARRATOR: Dr. Hywel Williams was carrying out
a survey of patients with melanoma skin cancers.
When I came to Mrs. Whitfield's notes
I noticed the somebody had put a comment,
dog sniffed at mole in exclamation marks.
And I had a laugh of it at the time,
but I thought, well, hang on.
There may be something in this.
And I rang up Mrs. Whitefield and indeed
the dog had sniffed the mole, not just once, but on repeated
occasions, whilst ignoring other moles,
just this particular one.
And I said to the doctor at the time
they must give off some type of an odor
because my dog could smell it, or I
thought she could smell it.
It wasn't until I sort of thought about it.
I thought she must have known it was really bad as well.
I think that this particular dog was instrumental in saving
Mrs. Whitfield's life in that she had the type of skin
cancer, the melanoma skin cancer removed
at an early and curable stage.
NARRATOR: Boo was awarded a gold medal
for her diagnostic skills.
And the doctors hope that the rewards to medicine
may be even greater.
I think Mrs. Whitfield's story taught me to be open-minded
as a scientist to the potential diagnostic powers
of so-called lower animals.
And I think compared to our sense of smell
a dog's sense of smell is infinitely more powerful
and they may well have beneficial actions
for medicine in the future.
NARRATOR: In Lorenzo Abundiz's Californian home,
his two Rottweilers have pride of place.
Lorenzo believes he owes his life to one of them.
Her name is Cinder.
Hey, Cinder. Hi, Reno.
Ready to go for a walk?
Come on.
Let's go bye bye. Let's go.
Come on.
OK, little girl.
You ready?
NARRATOR: From their early morning call through wash
and brush up, this dog's master cannot
do enough in his best friend.
Lorenzo, a firefighter, likes to hike high up
in the Californian mountains.
Only there can he escape the stresses of his job.
On this particular day my wife was sitting at home in bed.
She couldn't go on hike with us.
So I just took Cinder and Reno myself to go hiking.
Cinder, Reno, come on.
Normally when we hike Cinder likes to be the leader.
She stays ahead of us.
And she likes to mark her territory before Reno.
Come on, Cinder.
Kennel.
Cinder, kennel.
LORENZO (VOICEOVER): And on this particular day
she acted real strange.
And what I mean is that she'd started turning around,
going back down the trail.
And I kept calling her, trying to bring her on.
Come on. Let's go.
So I wasn't in the hike about a half hour.
And I decided to cut it short and go back home because I
was thinking she was sick.
She never acted that way before.
As soon as I turned around and started
headed back down the trail she immediately became the leader.
She wanted me to get back down to the car and go back home.
So Cinder's looking at me with this glazed look in her eye.
And I didn't want to take any chances with her
because I love her so much that I decided
to go ahead and call of vet.
So as soon as I got up I felt this palpitation in my neck
and I felt it on my pulse.
An irregular pulse.
And it really started to scare me.
So then I got up to go get the phone.
And immediately I felt like something just grabbed my lungs
with all their might and just like two hands just squeezing
and everything.
Next thing I know I fall to the ground.
And Cinder's nudging me with her nose on my hand.
I can feel the phone there.
And I was very weak.
And I was able to dial 9-1-1 with my thumb.
I couldn't even bring it to my ear.
And I remember the operator had answered. could hear it.
And I said I was a firefighter and I
feel I'm having a heart attack.
Please send somebody immediately.
[SIRENS BLARING]
GIOVANNI: We received a 9-1-1 call to Lorenzo's house.
When we got there we found Lorenzo lying on his back
on the floor of his living room.
We found that his blood pressure was 270 over 130.
He was in great danger of having a massive heart attack.
And I think he was on his way to that when we got there.
LORENZO (VOICEOVER): If I would have continued up
on that to hike on the hill, which is normally about three
and a half, four hours, I wouldn't be here today
because if that incident would have happened up
there in the high altitude, I would have
died up there on that trail.
And there would've been nobody around.
GIOVANNI: Lorenzo's a pretty lucky guy.
If we hadn't got there when he did he probably would have died
and I think he owes that all to his dogs.
Kennel up.
[DOGS BARKING] Ready, Reno?
I think dogs in general have a special sense.
They can hear your heart beat 20 feet away.
They have the ability that we just need to take
time to listen to our animals.
[DOGS BARKING]
Cinder has the ability to know the rhythm of my heart.
And she probably can sense or smell
the adrenaline in my body.
The body chemistry was changing.
And she knew I was going to go down.
She knew that if I was going to go down
that I was going to need help.
So she decided to try and get me to go back down
and go back to the car.
And go back home where I can get help.
And I think she's learned that by the telephone
there can be human contact.
So that's what she brought me the telephone.
NARRATOR: Animals apparently as clever
as humans have amused and amazed scientists
and onlookers for centuries.
Some, or rather their owners, have made fortunes showing
off their incredible talents.
Porky pundits packed the playhouses of 18th century
Europe, their pet subjects mathematics,
mind-reading, and spelling.
Tobey, the sapient pig, played cards,
guessed the age of the audience, and even told the time.
Even more erudite animals followed in the 20th century.
Mathematical dogs, like Chris the Rhode Island mongrel,
performed calculations worthy of a computer.
In Germany Wilhelm von Osten claimed
he could train horses like Clever Hans
to tap out the answers to complicated sums.
Academics came from far afield to investigate
these strange and controversial powers.
Later an American horse, Lady Wonder,
was said to have learned secretarial skills.
She typed words on a giant keyboard.
I don't think we should take such stories too seriously.
The scientists who've investigated
these mathematical and mind-reading reading
horses and dogs dismiss them as brilliant circus acts
where the trickery involved was too subtle for all
but most vigilant to detect.
For example, it's virtually certain
that Clever Hands learned to respond to tiny gestures
or sounds made by his owner who gave him all the answers.
But there are other examples of animal powers
that can't be dismissed so easily.
NARRATOR: Today Blake the sheep dog shows
little sign of the incredible journey he
once made across East Britain.
His skills at driving hundreds of sheep into pens and fields
pale by comparison with his navigational talent.
The dog's odyssey when his owner had parked his truck
and trailer with Blake inside.
When Tony Balderstone returned only minutes later,
thieves had struck.
I was gone for about 20, 25 minutes.
And when I come back I just couldn't believe me eyes.
The Land Rover, and trailer, and dogs,
and everything had disappeared.
NARRATOR: The thieves decided to dump the trailer.
It was empty in a car park at Downham Market, a town far
from Blake's home.
It was here, a long way from the pastures
he knew, in the heart of a strange town that Blake's
incredible journey began.
The distance between Downham Market where Blake was dumped
and his home near Holt is about 50 miles as the crow flies.
But to complicate matters Blake took a roundabout route.
Blake wasn't seen till the next morning.
My son was going through Swaffham and see him,
but Blake being a bit of a loner,
my son couldn't catch him.
And I thought he was coming directly home.
Instead he went around by Little Fransham way,
where I sometimes run some sheep.
NARRATOR: Tony put the word out among Norfolk's farmers
and Blake was spotted by Jenny Mallon.
I saw Blake the day after having received a telephone
call from Tony Balderstone.
But unbeknown to me the dog I saw didn't really connect.
And he was in fact walking along the very, very busy A47
early one morning.
Blake was looking very, very sad with his tail down.
And I wished I'd known at the time that it was him,
but it just did not connect.
NARRATOR: By now Tony had contacted
the local radio station.
He asked listeners to be on the lookout.
When I got phone call from people, of course,
I went to where I had the call from, and then
tried to take my bearings, think which way he was coming home.
But he always took a different route what I did.
NARRATOR: Every time Tony tried to predict
Blake's route the dog would turn up somewhere else.
TONY (VOICEOVER): And after he got to Guist,
we had a phone calls at every little village.
People phone up that seen him go passed.
But every time I went out to look for him
I was about 20 minutes behind him.
And eventually he made his way back to where the sheep
are, down at Letheringsett.
And that's where we picked him up from.
NARRATOR: They were reunited at Letheringsett where
Tony had once kept some sheep.
Blake had decided to look there Tony.
He'd been gone five days and traveled
more than 60 miles to the village next to his home.
When he got back he was thin, and dirty, and really weak.
His paws were roughed up.
And he was limping.
And he looked at me for a few seconds
before he came up to me.
I think he thought he was going to get
wronged for being away so long.
NARRATOR: Scientists suggest Blake may have navigated
by linking together the places across the county
where Tony Balderstone had grazed his sheep.
By going from pasture to pasture he'd
found his way home in stages. -Stand.
Two or three years ago, Tony Balderstone used to graze
his sheep here in the winter.
And one could any presume that where the thieves
dropped him off he suddenly realized
that he probably knew the area.
And actually came back to the ground
that he knew several years ago.
[WHISTLING]
NARRATOR: Haverly Market in Devon
is one of the West of England's busiest cattle markets.
Here cows, calves, and bulls are traded between farmers.
But this was the starting point for one
of the strangest stories in the annals of animal navigation.
[AUCTIONEER CHANT]
NARRATOR: It was here that Blacky, a heifer, and her calf,
came to auction.
The calf was bought by this man, farmer Arthur Sleeman.
And its mother Blacky went to this man, Bob Wollacott.
Both men set off for their farms with their new purchases.
In Bob's cow shed Blacky the mother seemed far from happy.
When I brought her home and she was wild.
And she'd been taken away from her half.
We did the best we could for her.
We put her in the yard, bedded her down.
Give her hay and water some meal.
And when we came down the next morning the cow was gone.
NARRATOR: Early that morning a cow had been
spotted loose in a village.
The postman wasn't the only person to have seen
her trotting along the road.
Two of my neighbor's saw this cow and it was going our way.
It had a market ticket on it, but wasn't
their cow or anything.
And it came right down to our place.
NARRATOR: Arthur Sleeman woke up to discover
a strange cow in his yard.
His farm is more than seven miles from Bob Wollacott's.
This cow wanted to go in with the cows.
We let it in there with its calf.
And then immediately the calf went and suckled her.
NARRATOR: Fortunately the strange cow
still carried the auction lot number on her back.
Sleeman was able to call the market
and find out who owned the mystery cow.
The market confirmed it was Blacky, the mother
of the calf he and bought.
Bob Wollacott drove across to claim her.
When I saw the cow and calf together on knew that it was no
good bring the cow back on its own
because it would all happen again.
We bartered a bit [INAUDIBLE].
Eventually I came home with the cow and the calf.
NARRATOR: But how had Blacky found
her way to a place she'd never seen over roads she'd
never traveled.
I think she could hear the calf calling.
And that's what took her in that direction.
That's the only thing I can think.
Some people say that in the middle of the night when
everything is still that she might have heard
cries coming up through the valley.
But, I mean, it was a long way.
Never seen anything like it before.
And never will again I don't expect.
Being a sentimental sort of man,
I thought it was better to bring them back.
Let them go on together.
And that's what we did.
NARRATOR: After Blacky's maternal marathon
Bob decided they'd never be parted again.
Cow and calf spent the rest of their lives
together on his farm.
When Beetle the cat escaped from his owner's new apartment
in the heart of London, Robin Lefever was distraught.
The can had only been there for six months
and had never been out of doors.
We put up notices everywhere trying and hoping
that people would spots him.
And it was dreadful that he didn't come back.
And we really didn't expect to see him again at all.
NARRATOR: With Beetle at large Rob
Lefever was deeply concerned.
The animal was adrift in the capital.
All he'd known before coming to the city
was the quiet countryside around the family's cottage
near Canterbury 70 miles away.
Months passed and Lefever thought
he'd never see Beetle again.
Until one day that he'll never forget.
Well, I was at work.
And I got a call from my parents to say that they
had some incredible news.
And that our neighbors had found Beetle.
He'd turned up in their wood shed/ I was absolutely amazed.
It was several months later.
And when we brought him home again he was completely
familiar in his surroundings.
Back in usual spots.
NARRATOR: Back home in Kent the cat didn't even look thin.
the family thought that somehow Beetle
had been charming a few free lunches along the way.
But the real mystery is how on earth this cat
could have found his way.
His route must've taken him across Europe's busiest
streets, through menacing traffic, and all of it
along an unknown route.
ROBIN (VOICEOVER): To get back here
the incredible thing is that he would have
come from North Kensington.
And he would have to go right the way
across London, across the Thames,
right the way through south London, right the way down
passed midway.
And probably went across it.
And he then have to have traveled
right the way through Kent, right
down to here passed Cantebury.
I can't explain how he did it at all.
He's got a brother from the same litter who was brought
to a coastal town near here.
And that was 30 miles away.
And he walked straight back here again as well.
And so I can only imagine that there's something particular
to this area or maybe to that particular litter of cats
that they're just homing cats.
Claims that animals can navigate enormous distances
present problems for scientists.
It's so difficult to check all the facts
that even experts can be fooled.
NARRATOR: In Washington DC, Dr. Michael Fox is one of America's
best-known veterinary surgeons.
He writes in newspapers across the country.
And he also travels the world representing
the United States in international animal welfare.
His credentials and know-how in animal matters
are impeccable, which makes it all the harder
to understand how he was caught up in a classic case
of mistaken identity.
[CATS MEOWING]
MICHAEL: We were living in Galesburg
Illinois in a small apartment and decided
to move into the countryside.
It was about six miles away, a little cottage
on the edge of some farmland.
And Igor was a young male Siamese.
And we took Igor along with us.
But after a few days he disappeared.
We searched all over the fields and around the ponds,
and the wood lot, and so on.
Calling his name, we went out at night
with a flashlight hoping to find him hunting or something.
And he had a very loud voice, but no Igor.
It was probably after a couple weeks I'd say.
First of all, we heard meowing and a scratching noise.
And there was a Siamese cat looking at us
through the kitchen window.
And I said, good lord.
It's Igor come back.
He was skinny, emaciated.
So we open the door.
And this cat walked in as though he'd lived there forever.
And we thought, well, that's it.
NARRATOR: But six weeks later came a dramatic and confusing
development.
We had a call from neighbors saying that there was
a Siamese cat in terrible condition wondering
around where you used to live.
Perhaps you ought to come over and have a look at this animal
because we did hear that your Siamese cat had disappeared.
Well, of course, we simply couldn't believe
this, what we were doing.
We had whom we thought was Igor II here.
This couldn't be Igor.
And it's an impossible journey.
Back into town we were living in a rural area.
Igor had never made that journey on foot.
And he certainly couldn't have seen much when we drove out
to the country place because we were piled
with boxes and everything else.
And he was in a small cat cage more or less
on the floor of the car.
But we were both shocked when we saw this cat.
it was Igor.
NARRATOR: But if this was the really Igor, how had he
found his way back to the Fox's original home?
Michael Fox believes animals can somehow
tune in to the minds of humans.
My interpretation is that the animals
are tuned in to an emotional realm
that I call the empathosphere.
They're able to through empathy sense
where their loved ones are.
It's like the loved ones are an emotional antenna
and the animal can home in on it.
It's part of the great mystery of which we are a relatively
insignificant part.
And I'd like to think that our animals can keep us in touch
with this mystery with an aspect of the sacred, and the unknown.
[INAUDIBLE].
These stories certainly make me wonder.
Although mistaken identity can never be ruled out,
the sheer volume of cases where animals seemed to have found
their way home over great distances
suggests that we have much to learn about their powers.
If we could understand what's really going on when dogs
apparently diagnose illness, perhaps a whole new branch
of medicine could be opened up.
And I'll certainly never again think
of my own non-human companions as dumb animals.
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