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The police dog shot by a Baltimore police officer is expected to make a full recovery, the Baltimore Sun reported.

Blade, who mistakenly attacked an officer during a pursuit of a suspect, underwent surgery today, according to staff at the Falls Road Animal Hospital, where the German shepherd was being treated.

The dog should be released this week, said Dr. Keisha Adkins, who performed the surgery. The dog faces four to six weeks of restricted movement but should be able to comfortably walk after that. Adkins said the surgery involved removing bullet fragments from the dog’s shoulder.

The unidentified officer who shot Blade wasn’t aware he was a police dog, a police department spokesman said.

A case of double mistaken identity led to a Baltimore police officer shooting the Baltimore police dog who attacked him Sunday night.

Police called in a K-9 unit to help chase a man who drove through a checkpoint near Wegworth Park, off of Hollins Ferry Road, then exited his car and started running, according to a report in the Baltimore Sun

When the K-9 unit arrived, a German shepherd named Blade was unleashed to pursue the motorist. When another officer arrived on the scene from a different direction, he was attacked by the dog. The dog, possibly mistaking him for the suspect, leapt on the officer and bit him about the upper body.

The unidentified officer, not knowing the dog was a police dog, pulled out his handgun and shot the dog at least once.

A police spokesman said the dog was taken to Falls Road Animal Hospital in Mount Washington, where he underwent surgery for a bullet wound. The spokesman said he did not know how many times the dog was shot, or what condition he was in.

The officer, who was wearing body armor, was not seriously injured.

Meet Tom Skeldon, the dog warden — yes, they still use that prison-esque title there — for Lucas County, Ohio.

If he seems a tad perturbed in this video, part of a Toledo Blade report, it’s because a lot of folks — many of them part of the “criminal element,” he says — are calling for him to resign.

Animal-rights groups say Skeldon refuses to work with them and is focused on killing dogs — 2,483 last year and 1,848 so far this year, based on a Blade review of records in the dog warden’s office.

About three of every four dogs that enter the pound don’t make it out, and are instead injected with fatal doses of chemicals each week, frozen in room-sized freezers at the pound, and buried in area landfills. Lucas County’s dog adoption rate was a dismal 13 percent, much lower than in neighboring counties.

The continued killing is at the center of recent calls for the warden to step down. Among those requesting he depart is the Ohio Coalition of Dog Advocates, whose members, armed with candles, staged a vigil outside the pound last month.

Skeldon, however, says the facility’s adoption and kill rates are “statistically glowing,” and that those calling for his resignation are misguided. He told the newspaper that his staff euthanizes only the lamest, oldest, meanest, and most incorrigible of the dogs in their care. Except for unlicensed “pit bulls.” They kill all of those. The dog warden’s office has killed at least 932 “pit bulls” or “pit bull” mixes this year, including 46 “pit bull” pups.

One Lucas County Commissioner, Ben Konop, has also suggested Skeldon resign.

Skeldon, who has been warden since 1987, said that he will not step down from his job and vowed to stay until his retirement, “sometime in 2011.”

This photo helped authorities in Shelby County, Tennessee get the search warrant that was used in a predawn raid that led to the temporary closure of the Memphis Animal Shelter two weeks ago.

The raid followed allegations of mismanagement, mistreatment of animals and improper euthanizations.

The mayor of Memphis, A C  Wharton, fired Animal Services Director Ernest Alexander Friday — a day after residents held a candlelight vigil at the facility.

“I am not an expert on (animal shelters), but I tell you what, I can walk in here and tell you whether it is clean or dirty,” Wharton said Friday during a news conference at the shelter. “I can tell you the difference between a pet that has been fed and cared for and loved and not loved.”

Wharton’s decision to fire Alexander came after shelter employees improperly euthanized a dog and preliminary results of a city investigation showed the facility had been mismanaged, the Memphis Commercial Appeal reported.

In addition to Alexander’s termination, three other shelter employees remain suspended with pay until the city investigation is complete.

Last week, Wharton established a committee to review the shelter’s operations and installed surveillance cameras that the public can access online. Members of the committee will monitor the shelter daily.

Public pressure for Wharton to take action at the shelter — long criticized by animal rights activists — has been building since Shelby County sheriff’s deputies raided the facility last week.

The puppy in the photo was admitted to the Memphis Animal Shelter Aug. 18, and died Sept. 4.  A necropsy showed the dog hadn’t eaten in at least 72 hours.

Your dog licks your face because he loves you, right?

Ah, if it were only that simple.

There are those that will assure you that yes, those licks mean affection — your “fur babies” are showering you with, in addition to a little slobber, love and gratitude.

There are also those more scientific types who will dissect the act so emotionlessly as to leave you never wanting another lick again — or perhaps even another dog, or at least not another dog book.

Thank Dog, then, for Alexandra Horowitz, who in her new book “Inside of a Dog,” manages to  probe doggie behavior  in a manner both scientific and passionate, without stomping on the sanctity of the human-dog bond like it’s a cigarette in need of extinguishing.

The book’s title comes from the Groucho Marx quote:  “Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark to read.”

What makes “Inside of a Dog,” released in September, one of the best dog books of the year is that it’s not too dark to read. Horowitz, a psychology professor, former staff member at The New Yorker, and long-time dog-lover is able — based in equal parts on her scientific research and her own personal experiences as a dog owner — to correct the many misconceptions about dogs without snuffing out the special light we see inside them.

As for those face licks, they have an evolutionary basis — it originally was a way for pups to encourage their moms and dads to regurgitate what they had eaten while hunting, thus sharing their prechewed bounty.

That doesn’t mean your dog is trying to make you puke everytime it licks your face, only that what’s now a ritualized greeting began that way.

The book gets to the root of other canine behaviors, as well, including:

· How dogs tell — and actually smell — time.

· Why it’s been futile leaving your television on for your dog all these years (and why this may be different now).

· How your dog really feels about that raincoat you make him wear.

· Why some dogs joyfully retrieve tossed balls and sticks while others just stare at you like you’re a fool for throwing them.

While not a training manual, it’s a book every dog trainer should read, and perhaps every dog owner who wants to truly understand not just what their pet means to them, but what their pet means.

The book goes into how dogs see, smell and hear the world, what their barks mean, what their tail wags mean. And it avoids the common oversimplifications associated with seeing dogs solely in terms of human behavior, or seeing them solely as modern-day wolves.

Horowitz, and the book, show some appreciation and understanding of the evolutions that have taken place, and continue to — the evolution of dogs, the evolution of humans, and the evolution of the bond between the two.

(Learn more about the latest dog books at ohmidog’s book page, Good Dog Reads.)

We’re happy to announce a new feature on ohmidog! — an entire section devoted to dog books.

“Good Dog Reads” — you can find a tab for it on our rightside rail — is a collection of dog book news and reviews from our archives, one that will be updated as new releases come our way.

We’ve also made it easy, should you be inclined to buy one of those we’ve featured, to click on the title or cover, which will take you to our Amazon Affiliate store for easy ordering. To go straight to the store, basically a compilation of some our favorite dogs books, old and new, you can click on “Books on Dogs” link – the photo of the bespectacled dog — on our rightside rail.

If you, like me, plan to curl up with a good dog and a good dog book (or five, or ten) this winter, we’ve got some suggestions for you. Please feel free to send us your’s. And remember the words of Groucho Marx — from whose famous quote the title of the book we’re featuring today was drawn:

 ”Outside of a book, a dog is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog, it’s too dark too read.”

It has been almost a year since the day Santa almost lost his shih-tzu. Well, it wasn’t really Santa, it was me. And it wasn’t my shih-tzu, it was a friend’s — and a dog who normally jumps on me as opposed to off of me.

Still, it’s a rare dog who doesn’t want his or her photo taken with Santa Claus — and there are four opportunities coming up.

The first is tomorrow (Sunday) — at the new Locust Point Dog Park.

Pet Pictures with Santa runs from 10 a.m. to  1 p.m. Proceeds go toward the maintenance of the park, which opened this fall.

Canton Dog Park will be holding a similar fund-raising event on Saturday, Nov. 21, from 10 to noon.

Two more Photos with Santa events will be held to raise money for Baltimore Animal Rescue & Care Shelter’s Franky Fund, which helps care for seriously sick and injured animals that arrive at the shelter — On Saturday, Nov. 21, from 10 to noon at Federal Hill Park, and on Saturday, Dec. 12, from 10 to noon at Riverside Park.

All the events are for good causes, and the photos make great Christmas cards.

(If you know of others pet photos with Santa events, please feel free to add them to this entry in the form of comments.)

 
There’s a beautiful story in today’s New York Times that should resonate with dog park frequenters everywhere.

We wrack our brains to remember the names of dogs we’ve met before, then wrack them even harder to try and remember the name of the owner, and once in a while we stumble, calling the owner by the dog’s name, or vice versa.

Dick Sebastian resolved he would not make those kind of mistakes at the small-dog run in New York City’s Washington Square Park after he became a regular there a few years ago, along with his wife Susie, and his dog, Kitty.

After a visit, Sebastian, 71 and a retired surgeon, would return home, draw illustrations of the dog’s he had met and label them with their names. Later, he started bringing his chart with him to the dog run, where new dog owners started asking if he’d include their dogs on his ever-expanding artwork.

That led to Sebastian attempting less cartoony, more serious portraiture, sketching some of the dogs he had come to know. He started with a pug named Sidney, and in less than a year, he had drawn and presented, as gifts, 50 dog portraits to their owners.

The dog park crowd appreciated Sebastian’s efforts. Said one, “The fact that someone would care enough that he’d want to draw what’s unique about your dog for you …”

Sebastian was appreciated as well for his kindness, and his interest not just in other people’s dogs, but the people themselves.

He’d become a fixture, but now he’s leaving.  Sebastian and his wife plan to move back to their native Ohio this month, so that Sebastian, who has Parkinson’s disease, can get easy access to care at a retirement home.

Times reporter Susan Dominus writes:

“New York is full of ad-hoc communities based on proximity and built up around mutual affection — walk into any watering hole at 7:30 p.m. — but they often have a live-and-let-live looseness to them. While parental oversight can stifle, en loco parentis oversight can be a rare, welcome comfort in the circles of urban life,”

 ”For passionate dog people, the folks at the Washington Square Park dog run are also, it turns out, passionate people people, and there have been myriad parties scheduled in honor of Mr. and Mrs. Sebastian before they depart.”

It’s not the first time I’ve said it, and I’m not the first one to say it, but dogs — if they don’t just automatically make us better humans — certainly manage to open up the opportunities for us to be.

Dick Sebastian, it seems, recognized that — most artfully.

(Artwork: The small dogs of Washington Square Park, by Dick Sebastian)

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is warning consumers not to use Pig Ears and Beef Hooves pet treats manufactured by Pet Carousel because the products may be contaminated with Salmonella.

The products were distributed nationwide in both bulk and retail packaging for sale in pet food and retail chain stores. Pet Carousel is based in Sanger, Calif.

Although no illnesses associated with the products have been reported, the FDA is advising consumers in possession of them not to handle or feed them to their pets.

The affected pig ear products were packaged under the brand names Doggie Delight and Pet Carousel. The affected beef hooves were packaged under the brand names Choo Hooves, Dentley’s, Doggie Delight, and Pet Carousel. All sizes and all lots of these products made by Pet Carousel are included in the alert.

Salmonella was detected in the treats during routine testing in September, leading to an FDA inspection of Pet Carousel’s manufacturing facilities. During the inspection, the agency collected additional pet treat samples. Further analysis found Salmonella present in beef hooves, pig ears and in the manufacturing environment.

Salmonella can affect both humans and animals. People handling dry pet food and/or pet treats can become infected with Salmonella, especially if they have not thoroughly washed their hands after having contact with the treats or any surfaces exposed to these products.

Pets with Salmonella infections may become lethargic and have diarrhea or bloody diarrhea, fever and vomiting. Some pets may only experience a decreased appetite, fever and abdominal pain. Infected, but otherwise healthy pets can be carriers and infect other animals or humans. If your pet has consumed any of the affected products or is experiencing any of these symptoms, the FDA advises contacting your veterinarian immediately.

Something old and something new sent two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning science writer Jon Franklin on a quest to document the transition of wild wolf to family pet.

The old thing was a photo — a man and puppy, exhumed from a 12,000-year-old grave. The new thing was a wife — he married a dog lover. Though he’d never been a dog person, Franklin gave in, and soon he and his wife were sharing their home with a clever poodle named Charlie.

Between watching his own dog evolve from puppy to family member, and his interviews and research, Franklin spent 10 years studying the origins and significance of the dog, and its peculiar attachment to humans.

The result is “The Wolf in the Parlor: The Eternal Connection Between Humans and Dogs.”

Franklin — a former science writer for Baltimore’s Evening Sun, now a journalism professor at the University of Maryland –  builds on evolutionary science, archaeology, behavioral science and his firsthand experience, arriving at the conclusion that man and dog are more than just inseparable; they are part and parcel of the same creature.

(Learn more about the latest dog books at ohmidog’s book page, Good Dog Reads.)