You don’t need a sense of numbers, in the abstract mathematical way humans use, to count.

Maybe a human child can’t count to 1000 but they could be taught to put a BB inside a jar every step they take. Then they can take a BB back out of the jar at every step on the way back. When the jar is empty, they’re near home. Even if they can’t count at all, they can keep track of thousands of steps this way given enough attention span and stamina.

Then, just imagine, instead of a BB’s in a jar it’s some chemical signal in the brain.