ohmidog!

Trooper, the pit bull found bleeding, duct taped in a bag and left for dead in a Washington D.C. dumpster in August, continues to recuperate and will soon be available for adoption.

“She’s nearing the completion of her rehabilitation and we anticipate she’ll be entering an adoption program real soon,” Scott Giacoppo of the Washington Humane Society told the Washington City Paper.

A resident of an apartment building in southeast Washington was throwing her trash into a dumpster when she found the dog, sticking her head out of a bag. The Washington Humane Society took the dog to Friendship Hospital for Animals, where she was treated.

Investigators believe Trooper was used as a “bait” animal by dogfighters.

After surgeries and treatment, Trooper left the hospital in October (when the report above appeared), for months of therapy at a facility that specializes in the emotional rehabilitation of abused animals.

The Washington Humane Society is still offering a $1500 reward for anyone who has information leading to an arrest in the case.

Hoping to breathe new life into his business, a Colorado kennel owner bought an old  hearse and converted it into a pet limo, adding pick-up and delivery to the services he offers pooches.

Merle Maser, owner of Land of Ah’s Kennel in Fountain, spruced up the old funeral limo with a paint job and uses it to deliver animals to and from the kennel at a cost of one dollar per mile.

Scientists studying compulsive behaviors in Doberman pinschers have located a gene they believe is associated with OCD — a finding that could lead to pinpointing a genetic source of obsessive-compulsive disorder in humans.

In dogs, compulsive behavior includes tail chasing, licking their legs until they develop infections, and pacing and circling — canine versions, perhaps, of repeated hand washing and other behaviors displayed by the 2.2 million Americans estimated to be affected by the disorder.

The Doberman study was done by researchers at the Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University, the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, and the Broad Institute, according to the Boston Globe.

Scientists took samples from 92 Doberman pinschers that displayed compulsive behavior. Dogs with the disorder compulsively suck their flanks or blankets. Researchers also used samples from 68 normal dogs, and did a genome-wide scan, searching for spots that varied between the two samples.

They found a genetic hot spot in dogs with the compulsive behavior — within in a gene called Cadherin 2, known to be active in the brain and in a family of genes recently implicated in autism.

Dr. Dennis Murphy, a laboratory chief in the National Institute of Mental Health, said he is working to follow the research by studying the same gene in more than 300 human patients with OCD, 400 of their relatives, and about 600 people without OCD.

“Identifying a specific gene that could be a candidate gene for a complex disorder like OCD is a gift to have,’’ Murphy said. “This might be a quick route in to a meaningful gene that just could be involved in the human disorder, as well.’’

More than 6,500 people have signed an online petition demanding the maximum penalty for the man accused of dragging a dog named Buddy to his death at Colorado National Monument.

The goal, organizers say, is to ensure Steven Clay Romero, 37, the suspect in the Dec. 30 torture and death of a German shepherd mix, “spends every single minute” in federal prison allowed under law.

The petition, and a “Justice for Buddy” Facebook page, were created by a Washington, D.C. woman, the Denver Post reported. The petition urges the courts to apply, upon conviction, the maximum penalty of three years in federal prison, a $100,000 fine and one-year of probation.

Romero is scheduled for a detention hearing today, and a federal prosecutor is expected to seek his continued pre-trial detention.

Romero is being held without bond on suspicion of aggravated cruelty to animals, a federal felony, at the Mesa County Jail.

He is accused of dragging the dog, which had been stolen, for two to three miles behind a pickup truck.

(For all of our coverage of Buddy, click here.)

A golden retriever in British Columbia is being credited with saving an 11-year-old boy’s life, fending off a cougar that charged at the boy.

The dog, named — wouldn’t you just know it — “Angel,” had accompanied Austin Forman outside to get firewood.

When the cougar charged, Angel ran in front of it and tried to fight it off, allowing the boy to escape, according to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The boy ran into the house screaming, “A cougar is eating Angel!” Police were called and were at the home within minutes. The cougar had dragged the dog under the home’s back porch by then, and the dog could be heard crying, according to CTV News in Canada.

Police shot the cougar twice, but it continued attacking the dog until a third, fatal shot was fired. Even after it was killed, the cougar’s jaws were still clenched on Angel’s face, the boy’s mother said. The dog lay still for a moments, then took in a big gulp of air and got up.

The Formans, of Boston Bar, about 160 miles northeast of Vancouver, said Angel received numerous puncture wounds around her head and neck, as well as a swollen eye, but that she was being treated and recovering.

(Photo: Royal Canadian Mounted Police)

A couple agrees to care for a friend’s Chihuahua for the weekend.

The dog’s owner doesn’t pick her up when the weekend’s over; in fact, she doesn’t try to reclaim the Chihuahua, named Lola,  for 10 months.

What’s the couple who cared for the dog owed?

According to the Nebraska Court of Appeals — the third court to hear the case — absolutely nothing.

The saga of Lola, a four-pound, black-and-tan Chihuahua, began Aug. 22, 2007, when Heather Linville of Lincoln asked her friends Travis Derr and Natasha Combs to care for her dog for the weekend, according to the Omaha World-Herald. Linville’s new apartment complex didn’t allow dogs, and she explained she needed time to make arrangements for her pet.

When, 10 months later, Linville asked to get Lola back, Derr and Combs said they wanted to keep the dog.

Linville summoned police, and the dog was returned to her, but Derr and Combs filed a small-claims court case, asking to be paid $2,700 for boarding the animal for 320 days.

A Lancaster County judge ruled in favor of Derr and Combs, a decision later upheld by a district judge. But the appeals court overturned the $2,700 judgment in a 3-0 ruling — proving, in my view, three heads aren’t better than one. What Lola’s owner did sounds to me like abandonment, pure and simple.

The court said Derr and Combs did not ask for compensation when they agreed to keep the dog for the weekend. They should have notified Linville if they were no longer willing to keep Lola for free, the panel said. The court said the couple was entitled only to reimbursement for a $152.98 veterinarian’s bill.

There’s not an animal shelter around — public or private — that isn’t entering 2010 overloaded, overworked and overwhelmed. Some are handling the burden better than others.

Six dogs died of neglect in Alaska — while in a city animal shelter. And the troubled city-run shelter in Memphis, raided and closed in the fall, recently euthanized a dog scheduled to be adopted — again.

The six Alaska dogs represented the entire dog population of the Dillingham animal shelter, opened by the city five years ago and staffed by a single officer whose job duties also included picking up drunks.

The city suspended the animal control officer after finding the skeletal, partially eaten remains in early December, the Anchorage Daily News reports. An examination of the dead dogs by a veterinarian determined they died from dehydration, starvation and neglect.

“I’ve never seen animals desecrated quite to this extent,” said Jim Hagee, a Chugiak veterinarian who frequently practices in Dillingham. “The cannibalism is really what got to me.”

The city closed the shelter and state troopers are now investigating.

Police found the dead dogs Dec. 8 at the unheated shelter. Garbage, tools and feces covered the floor. Decomposed dog carcasses were in cages or curled on the plywood floor, among them a black husky found inside a plastic bag and a 14-week-old Rottweiler puppy wearing a pink camouflage collar.

Hagee estimates the dogs had been left alone for four to six weeks. 

Dillingham’s mayor is Alice Ruby (mayor@dillinghamak.us), and its city council members are Steve Hunt (dealernt@nushtel.com), Carol Shade (cashade@starband.com), Bob Himschoot (bhimschoot@gci.com), Keggie Tubbs (tubbs@dillinghamak.us), Sue Mulkeit (mulkeit@dillinghamak.us) and Tim Sands (sands@dillinghamak.us).

Meanwhile, in Memphis, a worker mistakenly euthanized a dog last week that was set to be adopted – the second time that has happened since  authorities raided the facility Oct. 27, and cameras were installed to allow the public to monitor the shelter on the Internet.

“I do not condone, I do not accept, I do not seek to excuse what happened to that pet,” said Mayor A C Wharton. “I accept responsibility for it, and I hope our city will say we collectively take responsibility for these innocent creatures.”

He added, ”When you’re in there and you’ve killed 25 dogs, and that’s what you’re doing, sometimes you lose sensitivity and you’re not as alert,” said Wharton. “What’s the difference, the fifteenth dog, and the sixteenth dog and the twenty-sixth dog? That’s the culture and somehow we have to break out.”

Shelby County Sheriff’s Deputies raided the facility in October after reports of abuse and neglect. An investigation continues into the shelter’s finances and whether euthanasia drugs are missing. Criminal charges are expected.

One can contact the Memphis mayor and city council members here.

(Photo: Dillingham Police Department)

The dawning of a new year means it’s time to paws and take a good look at yourself, and if you don’t like what you see, resolve to change it.

Then again, upon further reflection, you could just bark about it some.

Here’s some video of the snowboarding bulldogs from yesterday’s Tournament of Roses Parade.

Tyson and Tillman and three others snowboarded down the float, billed as the longest single chassis float ever.

Last year, Tyson and Tillman, skateboarded on the Natural Balance float. For this year’s parade, they made the switch to snowboards.

Thousands lined up to watch yesterday’s parade, the 121st. The theme was “A Cut Above the Rest,” and it was led by Chesley Sullenberger, the pilot who landed a stricken jetliner on New York’s Hudson River.