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It's probably something you've heard a bit about ~ how animals can sense human emotions. I never really used to think about it, but it's true. I think that the length of time you've been with the animal and how close the two of you are effects how obvious this is. The longer and more closely you've known the critter, the more obvious their concern when you're sad and the more obvious their happiness is when you're happy.

It's probably correct to assume that animal intuition is keener than human intuition and I think it's really great that one can turn to animal friends for comfort instead of human comfortings at times.

I have two close animal friends that I've noticed this trait in.

The first is my daughter, Rem-Rem. She's actually a bummer (orphaned) sheep that my mom and I raised along with her twin brother (who we sold). If I'm feeling sad she'll come over to me and lean on me and just keep me company. She'll nuzzle my knee and sometimes, if I stay in one place long enough, she'll lie down next to me. When I'm happy she hops (literally) across the field and begs for treats. She really is a sweet sheep.

The second animal is my big orange cat, Boo (or Bruiser). He's generally a friendly and slightly talkative cat, but today as I was sitting in the pasture just sort of curled up and crying silently he ran up to me mewing in a sort of urgent way and he totally butted into my space (even more than usual). He kept mewing and butting and rubbing against me until I petted him. He usually only rubs against my legs, but today he crawled up into my lap and started nuzzling my hair and trying to get at my face. When I finally petted him he lay over my lap purring and drooling, but he didn't use his claws to kneed into my thigh ~ which is unusual.