ohmidog!

Poet Ken Wolman’s dog, Cid, died Tuesday.

He wrote a poem about him Wednesday.

We’re publishing it here, with his permission, Thursday.

Wolman lives in central New Jersey.

SOBBING UNCONTROLLABLY IN PUBLIC PLACES”
(after a title by John Engman)

I started to write a love poem or
some bullshit variant of a love poem but then
the dog got sick and died the same day

and he took my memory with him, what-
ever might have been left after a minor
stroke and the remnants of grinding gears

and I forgot all about love poems because
I loved someone who would have seen them
as rhetorical fiddle, words he didn’t need to know

when all he needed to know was my hand
stroking his head, embracing his strong neck,
his knowledge that I would not leave him

until he had to leave me first.

KTW/8-5-09

An animal-themed art exhibit to benefit Baltimore Animal Rescue & Care Shelter (BARCS) opens tonight at Zella’s Pizzeria.

Tonight’s opening reception runs from 6 to 8 p.m. at Zella’s Pizzeria, 1145 Hollins St. Admission is free and complimentary refreshments will be served.

The exhibit, which features artists from the Baltimore-Washington area, runs through Oct. 5.

Commissions from sales will be shared by BARCS and Sowebo Arts, Inc.

For more information visit the website of Sowebo Arts, a non-profit community arts organization.

(Photo: Painting by artist Mark Adams.)

 
Reports are circulating that a small dog swimming in a lake at a Bucks County, Pa., park was pulled under by a snapping turtle and eaten.

Whether that’s what really happened or not, the dog was never seen again, and its owner was reportedly so distraught that an ambulance had to be sent to the park to sedate her, according to the Bucks County Courier-Times.

The paper quotes a township employee, who didn’t want to be identified, as saying a dog was killed by a snapping turtle about three weeks ago in Falls Township Community Park.

The employee said the dog was off its leash, against park policy, and a ball was thrown into the lake so the dog could retrieve it. The dog supposedly never came back.

Park security supervisor Ralph Connor said he’s heard the story, but hasn’t been able to confirm that it happened.  ”There are plenty of snapping turtles in that lake and some pretty big ones,” he said, holding his arms about a foot apart to indicate the size.

Falls police said they did not respond, or receive a report about the incident, which reportedly took place about three weeks ago. Falls Manager Peter Gray said he is looking into the alleged attack: “We will be talking to staff members to try and get to the bottom of it,” he said.

On July 19, the newspaper reported, a member of its staff was on the banks of the lake near the dog park and was warned by a park ranger not to let the dogs venture to far out into the lake. The ranger said there had been reports that a woman had her toe bitten off by a snapping turtle and another woman lost her dog to one.

In the absence of official confirmation or denial, the story — suburban myth or not — seems to be taking on ”Loch Ness monster proportions,” the newspaper said. The owner of the dog has not come forward.

Large signs at the park say swimming and wading are forbidden, and dogs are only permitted in the water along the shore, and while on a leash.

 
The Christian Science Monitor recently took a look — a far deeper one than newspapers usually do — at the rising status of dogs in America, and concluded that there’s more behind the trend than a handful of wacky, dog-coddling pet owners.

It’s actually a huge story — one that’s been roundly missed because it has been a gradual shift, a slow evolution, and because the news media tend to be unable to look at dogs as serious subject matter. Instead it gives any pet story the cutesy pie treatment, complete with overused puns and chuckling anchorpeople.

The Christian Science Monitor story, by Stephanie Hanes, a former Baltimore Sun reporter, avoids that trap, and makes an effort to look at the reasons behind the dog’s rise from backyard denizen to full-fledged family member. It opens at Wagtime, the D.C. doggie day care center where around 60 canines show up each day, and whose owner is so busy she’s thinking about starting a waiting list for the full-time, $900-a-month slots.

“For many in the dog world, Schreiber explains, pet day care is no more of a luxury than preschool. Buying high-end dog food feels no more frivolous than serving organic fruits and vegetables; Prozac for the pup no more outrageous than Ritalin for the teenager.”

Wagtime, and all the other lengths Americans are going to for their pets, represent “a widespread cultural trend, a phenomenon that could easily be called America’s pet revolution,” the article says.

The revolution is bolstered by the country’s exploding pet population, which has increased threefold since the 1960s, according to some estimates, and pet industry sales that have grown to $46 billion this year from $17 billion in 1994, according to the American Pet Products Association.

But, the story adds, “… it is the dog that has nuzzled his way to the forefront of our pet revolution. Love him or hate him, Fido is changing American society – in ways municipal and medical, emotional and economic, social and scientific – as never before.

Read more »

Laika, a Siberian husky “dog-napped” by a well-meaning passerby from the front of a Fort Greene shop where she was left tied last month,  has inspired a new bill that would make dog-napping a crime in New York. 

Assemblyman Joseph R. Lentol, who represents part of Fort Greene, wants to make sure pet-napping is taken seriously by the law, the New York Times reports.

Lentol’s media coordinator, Amy Z. Cleary said that under current law, stealing a dog is treated the same as stealing a VCR. Society, she said, has evolved to the point where a pet is considered a member of a family, and the assemblyman wants the law to reflect that, she said.

The bill aims to raise dog and cat-napping to a Class E felony with two years of jail time if convicted.

If a dog-napper aims to sell the animal for scientific research or for malicious purposes, such as for use in dog fighting, the crime would be upgraded to a Class D felony, under the bill, with four years of jail time if convicted.

The assemblyman is most concerned about those who would sell the animals for scientific research,  Cleary said. The National Association for Biomedical Research says 97 percent of all animals used in lab tests come from breeders or lab animal dealers.  About 66,000 dogs are used in scientific research yearly.

Some Internet commenters have expressed concern that the law could end up snagging animal rescuers, but Cleary said the assemblyman is working to address those concerns.

The couple who took Laika, Giusseppe Francis Leonardo and his wife, apparently thought she had been abandoned after she spent several hours tied up outside a shop. The dog was returned to its owner.

The Brooklyn Paper is taking credit for reuniting the elderly dog with her owner. Leonardo, who uses a wheelchair, confessed to taking the dog in the comments section of a story about the case. Surveillance video had captured images of a man in a wheelchair taking the dog.

The sad and disturbing case of the infant who was critically injured when he was snatched from his bassinet and carried to the woods by the family dog, now appears headed for a happy ending.

The baby, A.J., is home from the hospital, and is expected to recover fully. Meanwhile, Dakota, the 4-year-old “Native American Indian Dog, ” remains under the care of Jessamine County Animal Control’s SAVE Center where they are working to find him a home, ZooToo reports.

“We’ve had some nice offers from private homes,” said Jenise Smith, the center’s director.

At the time of the incident, in Nicholasville, Ky., just outside Lexington, AJ was just 3-days-old, having arrived home from the hospital on Sunday, July 19. He was snagged by the dog the next day, and spent nearly a week at the University of Kentucky Medical Center in Lexington, suffering two collapsed lungs, a skull fracture, broken ribs and various cuts and bruises.

The 4-year-old dog is one of three the family has had for years. Dakota had never shown signs of aggression to the family’s two other children, the Smiths said. The dog has she shown no signs of violence since being taken from the family.

On a less uplifiting note, the SAVE Center reported hearing that scammers were apparently at work, fraudulently attempting to raise money for Dakota. SAVE officials issued a statement last week explaining that “any other websites, emails, etc, soliciting donations for Dakota are NOT connected to the SAVE Center.”

There’s some irony in here somewhere:

In June, Sioux City Councilman Aaron Rochester had his dog seized by authorities after the dog bit a man and was deemed vicious. Under the local dangerous dog ordinance, the dog has to be euthanized.

The councilman appealed Animal Control’s decision twice, and has until Aug. 16 to appeal again. But he said he has no plan to do that, according to an Associated Press story.

Many others came forward to try and save the dog, including someone who came forward with wire cutters, broke into an outdoor kennel at Sioux City Animal Control, and stole the councilman’s dog. No other dogs in adjacent pens were taken — only Jake, the councilman’s 3-year-old yellow Labrador.

Police say there are no suspects, and Rochester was adamant that he didn’t take his dog and has no idea who did.

To top it all off, Rochester is the councilman who led a successful effort last year to ban pit bull terriers from Sioux City, Iowa, saying they were too dangerous.

The theory that the domestic dog originated in East Asia has been challenged by an international group of researchers who say African dogs are just as genetically diverse.

The huge genetic diversity of dogs found in East Asia had led many scientists to conclude that it was where the domestication of the dog began.

But newly published research, based on analyzing blood samples from dogs in Egypt, Uganda and Namibia, shows the DNA of dogs in African villages is just as varied, according to the New York Times.

The research was originally aimed at tracking down a newly discovered “small gene” that led to wolves being downsized in their transition to dogs. Instead, as reported in the current issue of  Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers found information they say calls into question where wolves were first domesticated.

Lead scientist, Adam Boyko of the Department of Biological Statistics and Computational Biology at Cornell University, says he decided to look at village dogs at least partly because his brother, an anthropologist as the University of California-Davis, was head there on a honeymoon. Also there are more mutts there — dogs more genetically diverse than bred dogs.

It’s the mutts that may hold the key to the learning the origins of dog domestication.

Read more »

Banfield, the largest network of animal hospitals in the nation, has announced it will no longer do tail docking, ear cropping or devocalization on dogs — unless medically necessary.

The announcement drew praise from the Humane Society of the United States, and other animal welfare groups.

Headquartered in Portland, Ore., Banfield is the nation’s largest general veterinary practice, with more than 730 hospitals and 2,000 veterinarians nationwide.

Tail docking and ear cropping have become increasingly controversial over the past few years, and last year the American Veterinary Medical Association passed a resolution opposing the procedures when done solely for  cosmetic purposes.

Banfield came out strongly against the procedures, according to USA Today.

“After thoughtful consideration and reviewing medical research, we have determined it is in the best interest of the pets we treat, as well as the overall practice, to discontinue performing these unnecessary cosmetic procedures,” said Karen Faunt, vice president for medical quality advancement. “It is our hope that this new medical protocol will help reduce, and eventually eliminate, these cosmetic procedures altogether.”

There have been numerous attempts in several states — opposed by the American Kennel Club — to outlaw the practices.

The AKC says that “as prescribed in certain breed standards, (they) are acceptable practices integral to defining and preserving breed character, enhancing good health and preventing injuries,” and that “any inference that these procedures are cosmetic and unnecessary is a severe mischaracterization that connotes a lack of respect and knowledge of history and the function of purebred dogs.”

Tail docking involves cutting off the majority of a dog’s tail, generally within days of birth. It’s mostly done on terriers and hunting dogs. Ear cropping involves cutting a notch out of a floppy ear and bandaging it so that it heals in a more upright, “alert” position. It’s done on more than 50 breeds, including boxers, great Danes, schnauzers, Doberman pinchers and terriers.

You can read the full Banfield press release here.

We don’t usually run advertisements for free on ohmidog!, so don’t bother asking. But there was just something about this one I came across while trolling YouTube.

Plus, for those of you who didn’t go in for the doggie sex doll, here’s a way to help your pet satisfy a different kind of urge. Plus, I kind of liked the name. Introducing … the Scratch N All.