Doggie Intelligence.
A funny thing...the other day I was mowing the yard. The mower/slasher which we use had been broken for a while so now fixed, it was pushing through pretty long grass. I was doing it all in a big square working inwards, keeping an eye out (for snakes!!!) for the doggie's toys... he has about three or four rope pull type toys and loves them dearly. I noticed that much of the time I was mowing he was rolling about on his back in the middle of the diminishing center of long grass. He'd get up and go away sometimes and then come back.

When I was finished... I hadn't run over much less found one single toy...they'd been about when I played with him earlier.
When I went down to the shed to put the mower away, here next to his most recent bone, and almost lined up in a row were the three favourite toys. I'd been keeping an eye on his but hadn't noticed him quietly and with intent "saving" his treasures. Almost secretly.
To his eyes the mower would have seemed like it was chewing everything up maybe... I usually lock him inside when the big slasher is going because the man who rides this is likely not to see Thorn and the old dog is slow to get out of the road, but what I was using Thorn was unused to, and also unused to seeing me do it...its been broken that long.
I just wonder what he was thinking and please anyone who says that was instinct... if he'd just put them out of the way...maybe... but to line them up methodically some distance from where I was mowing... hm.