ohmidog!

Here’s an unusual perspective on saving a dog from an icy river, brought to you by the Fargo Fire Department.

Jake, an 11-year-old Lab, went into the not yet frozen-solid Red River in North Dakota after straying from his home yesterday, and couldn’t get out.

He clung to a piece of ice until rescuers arrived.

Fargo Firefighter Mike Seaberg went out on the ice to save him, while wearing a camera.

Today, Jake’s back home and doing fine.

The U.S. Postal Service is issuing four new stamps that honor working dogs.

The “Dogs at Work” series celebrates the enduring partnership between working dogs and the people who count on them.

The four dogs depicted in the 65-cent stamps are a guide dog assisting a woman who is blind, a tracking dog on the trail of a scent, a therapy dog visiting an elderly woman in her home, and a search and rescue dog standing in a field.

Artist John M. Thompson created original paintings for the stamps, which were designed by art director Howard E. Paine.

The “Dogs At Work” stamps will come out in January, 2012, and are being issued at the two-ounce rate.

Despite an outpouring of support from the public, time is running out for four dogs found starving and tied to a tree in Columbia, Tennessee last month.

The four, described as “American Shepherd-Bulldogs,” were all set to go to a rescue organization, but on Christmas Eve the plan fell through, News Channel 5 reports.

Now, unless another rescue can be found, the dogs are facing the end of the road — an outcome they weren’t far from when they were found.

“I was physically ill when I saw their intake pictures,” said Sonja Rine with Pet Pals of Maury County Organization.

“They were vomiting rocks and twigs because that is all they had eaten and they were all attached to one tree,” said Councilwoman Debbie Matthews, who is also trying to help them find a home.

An animal control officer spotted the dogs tied to a tree in their owner’s backyard last November. The owner told the officer the dogs hadn’t been fed in “a couple of days.” A judge ordered the owner to give the dogs up and donate $100 worth of dog food to the shelter.

He has yet to do so, but others in Columbia have stepped forward with donations.

“What a little love can do, it’s an amazing thing,” said Matthews.

The dogs are about a year old. They’ve tested heartworm positive, and have some other medical issues, so they need to go to a rescue before they can be adopted individually.

“They have tried so hard, they have such a will to live, they forgive. They don’t hold a grudge,” said Rine. “It’s gonna happen, it’s just gonna happen they deserve it,” said Rine.

Here’s a story with a happy ending and then some.

The residents of a group home for developmentally disabled adults in Belleville, Ill., were distraught when their adopted dog Gigi disappeared over the Christmas holiday.

Gigi had been rescued from the flooded Mississippi River in southeastern Missouri this summer and adopted from a humane society by residents of the group home.

The arrangement was working out well for all, according to Trudy Baxter, director of programs and services for the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Southern Illinois.

“We are one of just a couple of agencies that actually have a pet for the individuals with disabilities who live in our homes,” she said. “Gigi has been a wonderful pet. The residents have participated in petting her, bathing her and walking her. She has been a big part of the successful program.”

But according to the Belleville News Democrat, Gigi slipped outside and disappeared over Christmas. Despite a search of the neighborhood, and a $50 reward, no one could find her.

Hearing about what happened, a couple in Florissant, Mo., offered to donate their dog, Lily, a beagle mix who suffers from seizures, to the group home.

But then Gigi was found and returned safely, the News Democrat reported yesterday.

The couple plans to follow through with the donation, anyway, and give Lily to another group home operated by the Epilepsy Foundation of Greater Southern Illinois.