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Deaf and Blind Dog Rescues 3 Year Old

Aurora, a 3 year old, went missing after wandering away from her family property on a Friday night. Luckily for her, the family dog, a 17 year old Australian cattle dog named Max, followed her out into the wilderness.

Saturday morning, 100 police officers, emergency workers, and members of the public were searching for her.

Aurora’s grandmother Leisa heard her yelling, but she found Max first. Max, although deaf and mostly blind, led Leisa to Aurora.

One of the rescuers Ian Phipps said it was a wonderful outcome. “With the weather last night it’s quite lucky she is well because it was … cold and raining,” he told ABC radio.

“She’s a very hardy young lass to survive that without any ill effects and everyone, all the volunteers, are extremely happy.”

Source: ABC

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Heroic Pomeranian Saves Blind Chihuahua

Sandy the Pomeranian (10) managed to escape the house fire with owner, but ran back in to save her 13 year old friend, a Chihuahua named Tina.

Sandy ran to Tina and stayed with her until the firefighters arrived a few minutes later.

Their owner, Lily Ifield, was horrified when Sandy went back into the smoke-filled house.

“I thought my home was going to explode. There was just this big billowing cloud of black smoke. All I thought was ‘Oh my God’ and ran out. I couldn’t really see as there was smoke everywhere. It was confusing; I couldn’t ring anyone, because my phone was inside.

“I called sandy out and she was by my side, but the next thing I knew she had gone in to get Tina. She didn’t come out again and I was just crying.”

She added: “The firemen couldn’t believe Sandy went in to the smoke filled house to look for the little one.

“He said when he came in they were both sitting side-by-side in the kitchen and Sandy was looking after her. He was so brave he ran in not knowing if the house was going to go up and didn’t think of himself.”

Lily’s dogs (and parrot) escaped the fire unharmed.

“The dogs are best friends and Sandy is always looking after Tina. But after the fire they are even closer and they just cuddle up to each other,” Lily said.

The firefighter who brought the dogs out said “We got them out before there was a chance for them to be affected by smoke inhalation.

“The 13-year old one was the smallest C hihuahua you’ve ever seen. They were only going to come out together.”

Source: Express

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Dog Videos Dogs

Training Guide Dog Puppies

Have you ever wondered how they pick puppies that become guide dogs?

Me too. The video below shows part of the process a puppy goes through in order to become a guide dog.

This is how the National Guide Dog Center for the Blind (located in the U.K.) select their dogs.

They begin at Puppy Assessment with a PPA. PPA stands for Puppy Profile Assessment, and consists of 8 tests. Every test is scored on a scale of 1-7, 4 being ideal.

1. Follow

The first test measures if the puppy will follow and stay with a person, an important trait if they are to lead someone around.

2. Retrieve

The next test measures if they are able to retrieve a toy without getting too distracted. This makes sure they can be obedient and that they can focus.

3. Restraint

Next, they will hold the puppy and not allow it to move. This tests patience and obedience.

4. Noise

A guide dog needs to be able to hear everything around them, but not react strongly to every noise. This test makes sure that they can hear but not get scared by new noises.

5. Stroking

The most relaxing of the tests. The dog is pet to ensure they can accept human contact.

6. Squirrel

The puppy is called while a furry rag is dragged across the floor. They should notice the “squirrel” without chasing it down and still going to the person who called.

7. Tunnel

A guide dog should be able to enter unfamiliar or scary places in order to help a blind person through the world. This would include subways, so a puppy is led to a tunnel to see if they will go through it.

8. Ramp

This is the same as above, except with a ramp.

If a puppy successfully passes all of these tests, they will begin the long process of training to become a guide dog.

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Dog Stories Dog Videos Dogs

Are Dogs Smarter than Cats?

It’s an age old question: are dogs smarter than cats? Dogs can be trained to do a variety of tricks very well, cats are much harder to train. Yet cats are extremely skilled natural hunters with unlimited curiosity.

A neuroscientist, a dog cognition expert, and a cat behavior researcher got together to answer the question. When brain cells are counted, one animal clearly has more. Still, recent studies challenge our ideas of what it means to be smart.

Suzana Herculano-Houzel (the neuroscientist) studies animal intelligence by looking at their brains. She found that dogs have twice as many brain cells as cats.

“Then the logical implication is that, yes, dogs are much more capable than cats,” Herculano-Houzel said.

Brian Hare, the dog cognition expert, is hesitant to compare intelligence across species. Hare says intelligence in animals is usually put in human terms.

“Asking which species is smarter is like asking if a hammer is a better tool than a screwdriver,” Hare says.  “Each tool is designed for a specific problem, so of course it depends on the problem we are trying to solve.”

Every animal has been shaped by evolution to solve the most important problems they face in the wild. So judging cats against dogs is problematic, since they come from different environments with different challenges.

So how should we study animal intelligence?

“A lot of what we already know about intelligence in other species falls on a gradient or a spectrum,” said Kristyn Vitale Shreve, a cat cognition and behavior research fellow at Oregon State University.

Consider hunting skills, for example. Cats are one of the most skilled, dogs are in the middle, and humans around the bottom. But if we test math, humans are on top and both animals are at the bottom.

One of the problems is that we don’t have the right methods to investigate dogs and cats side by side to get meaningful data. So, at least right now, it’s unfair to make too many comparisons.

“There’s this perception of cats being untrainable or maybe hard to work with,” Vitale Shreve said. “Cats display a lot of individual variation and have distinct personalities, which make it hard for researchers to understand them.”

Basically, there is no definitive answer on which is more intelligent, and it really depends on what you need a dog or a cat for.

The important thing is that we all love our pets as much as we can.

Source: PBS News Hour

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Dog Stories Dogs

Lost Dog Found 4 Years Later

Bradley Wieferich thought it was a prank when he received a call from a microchip company telling him his dog had been found in Toledo four years after she ran away. Toledo is more than a hundred miles away from his home.

“I was stunned,” Bradley said.

Toledo police found his dog, Bambi, wandering around a neighborhood. The officer took her to animal control, where she was scanned. Her microchip discovered, and gave Bradley’s contact info.

“She was very thin, but very sweet,” said Laura Simmons-Wark, who works for the shelter. “Who knows where she’s been all this time. We have no idea how she made it all the way down here.”

Bambi, who is twelve years old, was reunited with her family. Bradley says he initially didn’t recognize her, but then saw marking on her muzzle and heard her familiar howl.

“She was ready to come home,” he said.

Bambi had been with the family since she was 7 or 8 months old. She started escaping after their other dog, a golden retriever, died of cancer. They bought another dog to keep Bambi company, but she ran away again. After searching for a long time, they had to assume that she had been readopted or had died.

“I’m really amazed that she’s back,” Bradley said.

Bambi shows the importance of micro-chipping your dog, and to make sure to scan stray dogs for them.

“Not all stray dogs are homeless,” Simmons-Wark said. “Some are just lost.”

Source: ABC6

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Dog Stories Dogs

He Arrives Home To Dog Acting Strangely — Then He Sees What’s Hiding In The Bath Tub

Imgur user squishiepeaches owns a dog named Crosby. There were previously two other animals, a dog and a cat, but they both passed away. At first, Crosby’s owner thought that we  was fine with being the only animal in the house.

“This is Crosby. He is the best good boy,” squishiepeachies said on Imgur. “About 6-months-ago, he lost his kitty friend, and just over a month ago he lost his best doggo friend that he’s had as a companion since he was 8-weeks-old. Crosby has been pretty okay about being an only doggo, or so I thought.”

Crosby actually had a secret mission to find a new best friend. What he did caught his owner completely off guard.

When squishiepeaches returned home, Crosby was acting strangely. “On Thursday I came home, and instead of our normal routine of Crosby howling with excitement to see me, he led me straight to the bathtub,” squishiepeachies explains. When he followed Crosby into the bathroom, this is what he saw:

There was a little kitten in the tub.

This kitty was meowing up a storm,” he explained. “I’ve never seen this kitten before, and although I do have a doggy door, it’s way too high off the ground for this little baby to have snuck in,” squishiepeachies wrote. “Seems to me that Crosby must have brought her inside.”

crosby

“She has an uncanny resemblance to the kitty friend he lost 6 months ago,” squishiepeachies says. “I talked to the neighbors surrounding my house and she’s been seen before, but no one knows who owns her.”

crosby

Squishiepeaches decided to take the cat to the vet, to see if it was micro-chipped. He needed to know if this cat belonged to anyone before he decided what to do next.

The kitten was not micro-chipped, so the question was, should he keep it or not?

“She was, however, spayed just a few days ago, and is thought to be about 4 months old,” Squishiepeachies said. “The vet basically told me that if I took her to the shelter she’d be put down because there are already over 300 kittens at the county shelter alone that need homes. He said I could try putting her outside and hope she goes home, or I could keep her.”

Since Crosby evidently like this kitten, and didn’t want to be an only child anymore, he decided to keep the kitten. They named the kitten Raina Lil Ray-Ray.

crosby

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This Husky Broke Her Tail, Vet Said To “Let It Heal,” But The Next Day, She Was Rushed Into Surgery

Okuma is 14 months old, but has gone through more than most dogs ever will. She was playing in the yard, when her owner, Lance, heard her scream in pain and run into the house.

Lance got Okuma as a small puppy, and has trained her to go for help. He takes her fishing, and she can run the 5 miles to the nearest cabin to get help if he is ever hurt or stuck. She loves to go fishing with Lance and will get upset if he doesn’t take her with him. Apparently, she also loves gummy bears.

Obviously Lance loves his dog, so when she came running in, low to the ground, scrapes on her legs, and a bleeding nail, he took her to the vet right away.

“We have a good idea of what happened to our girl now upon further investigation of where she came running from. 100 yards behind our house through the woods our neighbours have 3 new Horses in a new pasture. Okuma had to have smelled them and decided to go say hello and was probably trampled,” Lance says on Okuma’s GoFundMe page. “She would never hurt a horse or chase one and probably only wanted to play (she always wants to play with everyone and anything) but the horses couldn’t have known, and acted like they should have to a animal running up to see them.”

At the vet, they discovered her tail had been broken at the base of her sacrum. She was in excruciating pain, so vet gave her some pain meds. The vet said to wait and see if she would recover. They went home, and the pain meds didn’t seem to help, and Lance could not get her to go to the bathroom.

okuma

Okuma refused to leave her owner’s side, and they spent the night with her head on his chest. Lance hoped that she would feel better in the morning, but things were worse. He took her out to try and go to the bathroom again, but she was in even more pain. He called the vet, and they said it would be 48-72 hours before the specialist would get back to them. Okuma couldn’t wait that long.

okuma

Lance turned to a facebook group of husky owners. He found someone at the Michigan State University Veterinary Medical Center who could help. He sent them the x-rays.

“Within minutes she came back on the line and told me that this was really bad she needed immediate medical attention since the fracture looks like it could have severed all her nerves that control her functions to use the bathroom and will need to be seen to determine if surgery could not only fix the fracture and take away the pain but restore any nerve damage,” Lance said on Okuma’s GoFundMe page.

Surgery was the only thing to do. If Lance decided against surgery, Okuma might have needed to be put down. He would do anything to save his dog.

okuma

Fortunately, the surgery was successful and Okuma is recovering, although it may take a while. You can follow Okuma’s recovery on her GoFundMe page. 

okuma

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When This Dog is Finally Free From Chains, Her Reaction is Golden!

“Dogs Deserve Better” is a non-profit organization dedicated to freeing dogs and giving them a new and loving home.

One day they received a call about a family of 6 dogs that were always chained up, day and night. When the rescue group arrived, they were stunned. The dogs had only ever slept in mud, never a warm bed. They did not even have clean water to drink! It is sickening that things like this continue to happen.

Fortunately, Dogs Deserve Better showed up and saved the family, a father, a mother and her 3 puppies. One of the puppies had been rescued a couple weeks earlier.

Once the dogs were brought back to the clinic, they wanted to do something EXTRA special for the adult dogs. They hadn’t been off chain in a very long time. So Dogs Deserve Better decided to take them to a dog park. The way they react when they get off leash…well you will just have to see for yourself!

You can tell the mom is freaked out by the grass, because she hasn’t felt it in so long. She inches forward, expecting to be stopped by a chain. But once she realizes she isn’t tied to anything, she takes off running!

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Such a great and energetic time she has! How can you not feel so happy for this dog and her family! You just smile the whole time watching her.

1st "Freedom Run" off of the Chain

KENTUCKY RESCUE UPDATE: We thought you would like to watch as these two make their first "freedom run" un tethered in the 6 acre field. You can almost see that magical second when it "clicked" and she realized she was unchained.Thanks to YOU this moment was possible. We still need to have them all vetted, vaccines, spayed, neutered, etc. Every penny helps! This donate link is set up for their Vet care. Please donate if you can – and share. Thank you!! https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=BKPHGXJAC2KFE

Posted by Dogs Deserve Better on Monday, January 4, 2016

It’s hard to believe that animal cruelty still exists when dogs are just so great. But together we can make a difference. Share if you think dogs don’t belong on chains!

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These Two Dogs Were Abandoned at the Dog Park, with a Note That Will Break Your Heart

Most dogs love going to the dog park. They can run, play, exercise and have fun. But for two huskies, Jayda and Layla, a trip to the dog park ended in heartbreak. Mona Ahmed, the manager of the dog park, received a call about two Huskies at the dog park.

The woman on the phone explained they had been left with a box. The box was full of toys and food, and a note. The note read:  “Our names are Jada (black) and Layla (brown),” the note said. “We are nice 1-year-old dogs. Please don’t split us up. Layla gets scared without her sister.”

Mona got in her car and drove to the park, where she found Jada and Layla wandering around the park, confused about where their owner went.

“I started asking people, ‘Does anybody know how long these Huskies have been here?’” Ahmed said. “People told me, ‘These Huskies were here at 5 o’clock.’ But now it was 8 o’clock. So these Huskies have been here for three hours, running in the dog park.

“Somebody said, ‘Yes, I saw [a woman] leave the Huskies behind. She just told us she’s going to the car, and she’ll be right back. So nobody really paid attention to the fact that she was really gone,’” Ahmed said.

huskies

Although Mona was upset about the situation, she was glad that someone had called. Otherwise, the two dogs could have been out all night long. “They could have jumped the fence and gotten hit by a car,” Ahmed said. “There is a very busy road right in front of the dog park. The speed limit is 50, but people go 65 or more.”

This isn’t the first time this has happened. Over the ten years she has managed the park, 13 dogs have been abandoned this same way. Mona has rescued and found homes for all of them.

huskies

“This makes me feel angry,” Ahmed said. “This is not the way you give dogs away. All they had to do was ask for help.”

According to The Dodo, “Ahmed, who also founded Fresno Furry Friends, an organization that offers spay and neuter services, took Jada and Layla into her care and placed them in a secure foster home. The Huskies, who Ahmed believes are sisters, hadn’t been spayed or microchipped, so she’s going to make sure this happens before they’re rehomed.”

“We want to find the right home for the dogs,” Ahmed said. Although, they seem to be doing very well at the foster home they live at.

“She is very interested in keeping them,” Ahmed said. “In a few days, I’ll go and do a home check and everything else.”

huskies

It looks like Jada and Layla have a bright future.

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Shelter Dog Moves into New Home and is So Excited When She Discovers What is in the Backyard

When a dog finally gets adopted from a shelter, it’s hard to imagine what is going through their minds. It must be such a relief to be out of a kennel, find someone who loves you, and to move into a nice home.

For some adopted dogs, they have never seen grass, or been outside to play. So when they finally have a yard, their reaction is just so precious. If you ever moved into a new house as a kid, it’s that same desire to go exploring in your new surrounding.

For a shelter dog, especially one that was abused or has never experienced life outside of a shelter, something as simple as a yard can send them into a tailspin. Literally, their tails will be out of control. This is what happened with a dog named Christy.

Christy is a West Highland Terrier, and she was recently able to experience this incredible feeling. Her backyard even came with a treat that most humans don’t have the luxury of owning.

Christy’s reaction is so adorable, and we are so glad her owners were able to catch the whole thing on film. She went from shelter dog to spoiled dog! Christy was adopted by a wonderful family in Florida. As you know, Florida gets very warm in the summer months and many residents need a way to cool off. We are talking about an awesome, amazing, swimming pool!

The  newly adopted dog notices the pool, and goes into a frenzy! It’s insanely cute, Christy is unable to contain her excitement. Completely freaking out.

shelter dog

Her owners make her wait patiently, she needs to learn her manners after all. It was a great opportunity for Christy’s first training session. She is very patient in waiting for the door to open.

But when that door opens, oh boy. Let’s just say it’s one of the funniest videos we’ve ever seen. You may have seen excited dogs before, but wait until you see Christy.

Any dog lover will enjoy the video below. It’s hard not to smile when you see a dog so happy! The fact that she used to be in a shelter but now is so joyful warms my heart.

Christy’s excitement over something as simple as a swimming pool is definitely a mood booster. Watch this adorable video, but don’t keep it to yourself! Share on facebook if you love this dog.

Source: Eager Pup Really Wants To Jump Into The Pool by BrianFreeman