ohmidog!

There ‘s an incredible tale in the Quad City Times today about an owl that swooped down on a Pomeranian, grasped the tiny dog in its talons and took her on a two-mile flight.

Sadie’s flight last weekend covered between 24 to 30 city blocks before she either freed herself or was dropped, falling through the Iowa night sky and landing next to a street in Davenport.

The fall broke her tail and bruised her, but she survived and is recovering.

Sadie’s owner, Michelle McCarten, was watching fireworks with friends when the dog, frightened by the noise, jumped off the porch and ran to a nearby wooded area. Despite McCarten’s calls, and a search by friends, she couldn’t be found.

Two miles away, Jamie Padden of Davenport had brought her car to a halt at a stop sign when she was a small dog falling through the air. “It dropped out of nowhere,” she said. The dog landed right in front of her Jeep.

The owl glided down and again set upon the dog, which scrambled to get away. Padden open her car door and started screaming at the large owl.

When the owl departed, Padden scooped up the whimpering dog, took it home, gave it a bath and called police to report the incident. Then she took the dog to bed with her.

The next morning, Sadie’s owner and a friend, Kris Overstreet, resumed their search, calling police in Davenport about the missing dog. The police gave them Padden’s number.

Padden delivered the dog to her owner, who was in tears, the newspaper reported. Though no one really knows how long the dog was airborne, the distance from the woods where the owl was known to hang out and the spot where Sadie landed is about two miles.

Sadie is reportedly still shaky, and suffered bruises on her hind end and a broken tail. “She’s nervous. I’m giving her an aspirin a day,” McCarten said. “Getting her back is my best early Christmas present.”

(Photo:  Michelle McCarten and Sadie, by Jeff Cook/Quad-City Times)

More than 100 dogs showed up Saturday to have their photos taken with Santa in Baltimore’s Riverside Park.

Most, like this sweet beagle, seemed happy to get a little face time with St. Nick. About 2 percent wanted nothing to do with the fat bearded man in red. Only one growled at Santa. And Santa only growled once, when he stepped in dog poop.

Other than my boots, which I’ll clean up one of these days, there were no casualties, and about $1,000 was raised for the Franky Fund at Baltimore Animal Rescue & Care Shelter (BARCS).

Combined with an earlier Photos with Santa event in November at Federal Hill Park held last month, nearly $2,500 was raised for the fund, which is used to provide medical care for seriously sick and injured animals.

Those who purchased photos can view and download them here.

(Photo by Gail Burton)

Starting tomorrow (Dc. 15),  Baltimore Animal Rescue & Care Shelter (BARCS) will be waiving the adoption fees for dogs and cats seven months or older through the end of the year.

BARCS is also offering gift certificates to people who would like to give the gift of an animal. The certificate allows the recipient to pick the shelter animal of their choice.

Included with all adoptions are spaying and neutering, rabies vaccination, DHLPP vaccination, bordatella, de-wormer, flea preventative, a general examination, a food sample, a month of free veterinary care insurance, and Felv testing for cats and kittens. Baltimore City residents adopting animals will need to purchase a $10 pet license.

BARCS handles more than 11,000 animals each year — more dogs and cats than any shelter in Maryland.

BARCS is open for adoptions Monday through Friday from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. The shelter will be open from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on December 24 and will be closed on December 25.

While a terrier mix dragged behind a truck in Tennessee continues to recover, felony animal cruelty charges against the driver have been sent to a Knox County grand jury for review.

Knox County Judge Patricia Long ruled Friday there was enough evidence presented to send the case against Jimmy Lovell on for possible indictment, the Knoxville News Sentinel reported.

Lovell’s defense attorney argued the state had nothing to show that Lovell, 45, intentionally dragged his estranged girlfriend’s dog, known as “Little Brown Dog,” behind his truck on Nov. 3.

Prosecutors countered that witnesses warned Lovell a dog was attached by a leash to his pickup truck’s trailer hitch while he was stopped at a Knoxville intersection, but he kept driving anyway.

The dog was brought to an animal shelter within two hours of the dragging and continues to be treated at the University of Tennessee’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

Humans, as Steve Markwell sees it, create bad dogs. So humans have the responsibility to rehabilitate them.

Markwell operates Olympic Animal Sanctuary in Washington state — subject of the Fox News report above, and a front page story in the Los Angeles Times Friday.

“When people create these monsters, I think it’s people’s responsibility to take care of them. Not to just kill everything because it’s inconvenient,” Markwell says in the Times article. “The fact that they have their quirks, the extra things you have to be cautious of, in some ways it’s almost endearing. It’s kind of like, the world hates you, but I don’t.”

The Olympic Animal Sanctuary, located in the Olympic Peninsula rain forest, caters to dogs who would be euthanized or turned away at other shelters.

Among the more than 50 dogs now there are guard dogs who once belonged to drug dealers, wolf hybrids with violent pasts, and Snaps, the pit bull mix who made headlines south of Seattle in June when he attacked two women on the command of his owner, a 15-year-old girl.

The girl and three other youths were arrested and sentenced, and Snaps was facing a probable death sentence until Markwell stepped in.

“This vicious monster of a dog, he’s the sweetest thing in the world,” he said. Snaps is now one of the few dogs allowed to roam uncaged inside the sanctuary’s main building.

Markwell said the secret of rehabilitating the dogs is giving them space, exuding quiet kindness and corralling like-minded dogs together, allowing for socialization and management of bad behavior rather than trying to immediately eliminate it.

He scoffs at “dog whisperers” and rejects potential volunteers who say they have a “spiritual kinship” with animals, the article says.

“I have absolutely no place for people like that because they’re dangerous,” he said. “What it takes is common sense and experience. That whole ‘animals like me’ — well, animals like me too. But I take a really bad bite about once a month. Let’s not rely on that as our safety mechanism.”

What does BARCS want for Christmas? If you’re willing to sing along, karaoke style, we’ll tell you in song.

Ready? Start the video.

Treats (but not rawhides) and leashes of nylon

Dog food in sealed bags, but just Science Diet.

Stainless steel dog bowls and towels and sheets.

There are a few of the things that BARCS needs…

Hoses and trash cans and dust pans and bleach

Brooms, gloves and gauze pads and laminating sheets

Digital cameras to take doggie pics

Clippers and clipboards and duct tape  and ink …

Bottles for nursing and hay for the dog runs

No-slip dog collars in large and medium

Toys that are durable — Kongs and the like.

Plus a few things that they need for felines …

Toys (no catnip)

Fleece-lined cat beds

Non-clumping litter

Spray bottles, scrub pads and paper towels

And lint rollers, wiiiiiiiiiiiiiith refills

Donors are encouraged to check out the complete wish list and drop items by BARCS, 301 Stockholm St., where there are stockings waiting to be filled. BARCS also invites you to check out the adoptable dogs while you are there.

Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter (BARCS), located across form Ravens Stadium, cares for more than 11,000 homeless animals annually. The shelter is open Mondays through Fridays from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. The shelter will be open from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on December 24 and closed on December 25.

You can also help out BARCS by getting your pet’s picture taken with Santa today at Riverside Park in South Baltimore. All proceeds from the event, which runs from 10 to noon, go to BARCS Franky Fund for sick and injured animals.

(Thanks to Mark, an aspiring musician in England known on Youtube as The Music Mark, for providing our music.)

It has been a rough few weeks for Wilma Berrios and Tuti.

Three days after Berrios’ uncle died while waiting for treatment in a Philadelphia hospital emergency room, her dog, a 3-year-old male miniature pinscher, wearing a Los Angeles Dodgers hoodie, ran away, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported

In between spending time with her family to mourn her uncle, Berrios walked her neighborhood streets, sometimes in the early hours, posting and handing out fliers with Tuti’s picture — for nearly two weeks.

Eventually, both a letter carrier and a  police officer phoned Berrios with sightings of Tuti, and in tracking down those leads, she learned that Tuti had been picked up and taken to the SPCA animal shelter in Hunting Park.

When she arrived there, though, Tuti was gone. It turns out he’d been picked up by a rescue organization,  N.J. Aid for Animals in Sicklerville, and taken to New Jersey to be put up for adoption.

The SPCA contacted the rescue group and on Thursday Berrios and Tuti — still wearing his hoodie, but minus a couple of appendages — were reunited. The rescue group neuters all animals for which it seeks homes. Neither Berrios nor Tuti seemed to mind, the Inquirer reported. 

“I’m overwhelmed,” Berrios said.  “I’m so happy. There are no words in the dictionary to express how I’m feeling. I didn’t think I would get him, but there’s a God up there.” 

Berrios’ uncle, Joaquin Rivera, was a Philadelphia musician and community activist. He went to Aria Health – Frankford Campus for treatment of chest pains, was robbed of his watch while he sat in the waiting room and died while waiting, which hospital staff reportedly didn’t notice for an hour.

(Philadelphia Inquirer photo by Akira Suwa)

More than six months ago, a dog was hit by a car in St. Petersburg, Russia, and left to die.

But witnesses to the accident picked up the dog and brought him to a veterinary clinic. A veterinarian performed surgery, for free, but the dog’s spinal injuries were such that he lost the use of his back legs and wasn’t expected to walk again.

He was taken to an animal shelter, whose staff couldn’t bear the thought of the dog, who they named Tuzik, spending his life laying in the shelter’s dirt yard.

After a flurry of Internet searching and email exchanges, hampered by language differences, arrangements were made for Tuzik to be shipped to the U.S. and taken in by Pets With Disabilities, a non-profit group in Prince Frederick, Maryland.

The organization rescues and finds home for animals who have been injured through trauma or disabled by illness. It provides support and resources for the families of disabled pets and for shelters attempting to place special-needs animals into loving homes. Joyce Darrell and her husband, Michael Dickerson, founded the organization in 2000 after their dog Duke broke his back playing as a puppy. 

Tuzik arrived in October.

“Why a dog from Russia? We were wondering the same thing for many months,” Darrell says on the Pets With Disabilities website, “But Tuzik was on a mission to find a better life – and meet a family that would appreciate all he had to offer.” Darrell says he has “brought a sense of royal majesty to the rescue. It’s hard to explain, but when you sit with him, you have no pity for him – he really is not looking for that…

“He’s moving around the rescue with more confidence everyday. He’s begun to play with toys – and he has a huge heart to offer the right family.”

Tuzik is available for adoption. To see more of him and the organization’s other disabled dogs in need of homes, click here.

(Photo courtesy of Pets With Disabilities)

What do you get when you try to cross a bull mastiff with a Shar-Pei?

In the case of James Marinakis, arrested.

Palm Beach County Animal Care and Control removed dozens of abused and neglected animals from his 27-acre property near the Everglades, where investigators say he was trying to breed a “super dog,”  CBS 12 reported.

Marinakis, of West Boca Raton, faces animal cruelty charges for beating dogs, leaving animals outside in the hot sun without food and water, letting sores fester, and leaving them covered in feces, officials said.

Investigators said Marinakis was trying to breed “centaurians” — a cross between a bull mastiff and a sharpei.

Officials said the seized animals suffered from skin conditions and sores. Witnesses reported seeing Marinakis beat the dogs with a golf club and PVC pipe, according to the report. Marinakis, who doesn’t have a license to breed dogs, has been cited more than a dozen times since 2001 in connection with  animals on his property.

A Tennessee couple found more than kibble when they lugged a bag of dog food home from the pet store this week.

Within the bag’s creases was a wedding ring.

Krista Berg of Murfreesboro called the manufacturer, then the pet store, where she found the ring’s rightful owner, employee Mike Stoddard, who’d apparently lost it while stocking shelves at the Murfreesboro PetMart.

The couple returned the ring to him, according to News Channel 5.