ohmidog!

Our favorite Super Bowl ad? This one, of course.

And that was even before we found out it only cost $200 to make.

Joshua Svoboda and Nick Dimondi, both in their 20′s, made the ad, called “Underdog,” with an untrained dog. They didn’t know it would even air Sunday night on CBS, according to the Associated Press.

It was one of four ads aired by Doritos maker Frito-Lay, all of which were created by fans, who were competing for $5 million in prize money if the ads ranked highly in commercial roundups.

The ad came in second in USA Today’s annual Super Bowl Ad Meter, which ranks ads based on a viewer panel’s response, winning the two ad-makers $600,000. The two, from Cary, N.C., said they planned to use the money to pursue film careers.

They said they wanted to make an ad with a dog because they felt those ads are more popular with consumers.

 
There are more cats and dogs in the UK than anyone thought.

According to figures in a new study, there are around 10.3 million cats and 10.5 million dogs in the UK, a total of 4 million more than pet food manufacturers had estimated, according to The Guardian.

The report, based on polling, also concludes that cat owners are better educated.

The study is the first published in a peer-reviewed scientific journal in 20 years — when there were 6.2 million cats and 6.4 million dogs.

Cats, according to the study, are more likely to live in households with someone with a college degree. A poll of 2,524 households found that 47.2% of those with a cat had at least one person educated to degree level, compared with 38.4% of homes with dogs. We will presume that cat owners did the math.

Last year, the Pet Food Manufacturers Association estimated — not too precisely, as it turns out — the size of the UK domestic cat and dog population at about 8 million each.

The new study, published in the Veterinary Record by Jane Murray, a cats protection lecturer in feline epidemiology at Bristol University, does not take into account strays or those animals in shelters.

About  7% of UK households own both a cat and dog.

(Photos: My dog Ace, your cat Miley, both of whom got their education on the streets; by John Woestendiek)

A former animal control officer in Hoosick, N.Y., admitted in court last week that he shot and killed stray or loose dogs and buried them in a manure pile on his farm.

Matthew Beck, 46, pleaded guilty to official misconduct, larceny, cruelty to animals and violating environmental regulations.

According to the Albany Times Union, he will spend 10 days confined to home with a monitoring device, two weekends in jail and be placed on three years’ probation.

The case began last spring when a local resident, April Stevens, learned that Beck had picked up her two missing dogs. The dogs never showed up in the local animal shelter, though.

Investigators went to Beck’s farm, dug through his manure pile and discovered several dog carcasses, including two skulls with bullet holes which were determined to have been owned by another resident. Stevens’ dogs were never found but Beck pleaded guilty to the larceny charge in connection to their disappearance, as well as other misdemeanors.

“This is not what we really wanted. We wanted to see him do some real jail time,” said Stevens, who was wearing pictures of her dogs pinned to her shirt.  “At least there is some jail time to give him an opportunity to think about what he did.”