You know, we’ve always suspected that dogs were pretty bloody smart. We haven’t needed science to prove it either. You can just watch the b*stards for a bit and you can see they’re figuring the system, learning the ways of man, and plotting their way to some free food. One dog from Monterrey in Colombia is pretty much the king of the game – he’s clocked onto ‘money’ and buys himself a couple of cookies every day!

All right, let’s get the awkward disclaimer out of the way. This dog’s name is Negro. Fair dinkum. Make of that what you will. We’re just reporting the story.

Right, Negro, who’s clearly a bloody smart canine, was adopted by the Diversified Technical Education Institute of Monterrey Casanare in Colombia some time ago – and he used to make a pretty good living out of scrounging cookies from students.

But one day, something clicked for Negro. He didn’t need to rely on students and wait for them to buy him cookies when he could just buy them himself. The clever b*stard watched the students hand over notes to pay for the cookies and developed a plan of attack.

To Negro, those notes may as well have been leaves. He sees in black and white and they were thin and roughly leaf-shaped. The bloody brainiac started coming into the store with leaves in his mouth.

‘One day, spontaneously, he appeared with a leaf in his mouth, wagging his tail and letting it be known that he wanted a cookie,’ teacher Angela Garcia Bernal told The Dodo.

Apparently, after realising how well this coy little plan of his had worked – and would continue to work – he made it a daily routine.

‘He comes for cookies every day,’ sales assistant Gladys Barreto said. ‘He always pays with a leaf. It is his daily purchase.’

Of course, like any dog, Negro is a hungry little bugger and he just wanted more and more cookies. Unfortunately for him, the shop’s owners had to limit Negro to two cookies a day. If they hadn’t, he’d eat them out of house and home.

Final thought: I bloody love dogs. Tricks like this show how bloody awesome they are. People get all worked up because monkeys are using tools, but when dogs have figured out currency, you know that the future is an awesome place. Good on you, Negro. You’re a bloody tops dog!