For as long as people have loved their pets, some people have ascribed abilities to them

that border on the supernatural, among these an ability to predict future events.

Whether it's an animal in a bar that predicts the outcomes of sporting events, or a ground

hog that can tell us when spring is coming, we love our animal predictors.

But is any of it true?

We're going to find out today on Skeptoid.

You're listening to Skeptoid.

I'm Brian Dunning from Skeptoid.com.

Animal predictors, psychic, sensitive, or silly.

In the wake of a popular 2014 hoax email going around, claiming that animals were fleeing

Yellowstone National Park and record numbers to escape an impending volcanic eruption.

It probably makes sense to have a Skeptoid episode addressing animal predictions in general.

Most are not hoaxes.

That doesn't necessarily mean they're psychic, though.

There are a range of possible explanations for the apparent ability.

Perhaps the animals have some special sensitivity.

Perhaps it's an error made by the people who observe them.

Today, we're going to look at a few popular cases of famous modern animals believed to have the power of prediction.

Oscar the Cat.

In 2007, the media went wild over an article published in the highly respected scientific journal, the New England Journal of Medicine,

claiming that a cat named Oscar was able to predict which patients at the Steer House,

Nursing and Rehabilitation Center in Providence, Rhode Island, were about to die,

...