ohmidog!

They say dogs don’t have as many facial muscles as we do, and therefore are limited in their facial expressions.

A look at this sleeping boxer would seem to indicate otherwise.

Sleeping with eyes open, tongue out, and amid a full throttle snore, he manages to make more faces than Jim Carey on … whatever it is he’s on.

To see more sleeping dogs, click here, then click on a headline for a video.

Wouldn’t you really rather get there in a BMW?

Of course you would, unless “there” happened to be a neutering appointment.

This boxer is eager to hit the road until — thanks to the latest technology — he seems to become aware of the destination, and makes a quick exit.

(To see all our “Woof in Advertising” posts, click here.)

Rebecca Carey had been finding homes for animals in need, volunteering at animal shelters and taking in rescues from the time she was a young teen, and all the way up to the weekend before last.

That’s when one or more of the five dogs in her care attacked and killed the 23-year-old woman at her home in Decatur, police say.

Despite that, and the euthanization of all the dogs, her family has set up a fund in her name to support rescue efforts at Loving Hands Animal Hospital, where Carey worked.

“Since the second grade when she read the book ‘Throw Away Pets,’ she vowed to be a voice for all animals,” her parents, Greg and Ellen Carey, said in a statement. “Upon placing her first abandoned animal in a permanent loving home in 2003, she volunteered countless hours with rescue networks and animal shelters. There she did what she loved the most: rescuing animals from untenable situations to find them safe, loving homes.”

LuAnn Farrell, the co-founder of the non-profit Angels Among Us Pet Rescue,” said Carey was known for taking in hard to place animals.

“She was one of the good ones because she did take in the ones nobody else would help,” Farrell told 11 Alive in Atlanta.

Farrell said the young woman’s death “kind of makes us all slip back just a little bit and say this is something that can actually happen,” but that she hopes it doesn’t dissuade people from helping animals in need.

“You know that’s the one thing she wouldn’t want people to do, shy away from rescue. It’s already hard enough. We’re already having thousands of them being put to sleep every day. There’s only so many of us that can do it,” said Farrell.

Carey had one of the rescue organization’s animals, a boxer mix, living with her at the time of her death, as well as two Presa Canarios and two pit bulls, one of which, Napolean, she had adopted six years ago when he was eight weeks old.

She was dogsitting one of Presa Canarios, and it was that dog’s owner, Jackie Cira, who discovered Rebecca’s body after she failed to show up for work at Alpharetta’s Loving Hands Animal Clinic.

Police originally investigated her death as a homicide, but last Thursday they announced she was killed by multiple dog bites.

The dogs were all euthanized Wednesday, with the consent of Carey’s parents, a police spokesperson said.

Cira, in remarks to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, questioned whether it was necessary to put all the dogs down, and why animal control officials made no apparent effort to determine which dog or dogs inflicted the bites leading to Carey’s death. Cira’s dog, Danai, was also euthanized.

Tim Medlin, interim director of DeKalb Animal Control, said public safety was the priority: “I won’t put another person at risk,” he said.

Donations in Carey’s name can be made to www.angelsrescue.org, by putting Carey’s name in the remarks section. They can also be mailed to Loving Hands Animal Hospital, 13374 Hwy 9, Alpharetta, GA, 30004.

A mother dog was photographed rescuing her litter of puppies from a house fire in Chile.

In the photos, a German shepherd mix named “Amanda” carries five of her 10-day old pups in her mouth, dropping each onto a fire truck as flames ravaged her owner’s home Thursday in Santa Rosa de Temuco, Chile.

The fire, at the home of Omar Torres, the father of boxer Tumbaito Jose Torres, was apparently the result of a car bomb explosion.

The puppies were transported to La Clínica Veterinaria Altamira where four are recuperating with their mother. 

One of the puppies died on Thursday night after suffering burns to his abdomen and mouth.

Veterinarian Felipe Lara told the Chilean newspaper Soy Temuco that Amanda defended her puppies when they tried to take them away for treatment.

(Photos: Associated Press /Jose Monsalve, Diario El Austral de La Araucaria)

Among those watching Nicola Adams win a gold medal for the UK in boxing was her Doberman.

The Leeds boxer won her flyweight event on Thursday, becoming the first woman to ever win a gold in the new Olympic sport, SFGate reports.

Her dog, Dexter, currently lodged at a boarding kennel called Mypetstop, watched on a TV installed in his room at Adams’ request, according to the Morley Observer.

Sheli Dobbie, manager at Mypetstop, said requesting a television for one’s dog isn’t all that uncommon anymore. “However, this will certainly be a first where the dog can watch their owner – especially in the Olympics – so I’m sure Dexter will be excited.”

Every boxer — and we’re speaking here of the human kind who puts on gloves and climbs into a ring — needs a trainer.

Manny Pacquiao needs a  terrier.

“He’s part of my team,”  the World Boxing Organization welterweight champion told the Wall Street Journal. “He’s a special dog.”

Pacquiao’s Jack Russell terrier, who goes by Pacman (the boxer’s nickname), is helping him train for Saturday’s welterweight bout against Timothy Bradley. The dog normally runs off leash, setting a speedy pace for Pacquiao on streets and trails around Los Angeles.

Pacquiao hasn’t lost a fight since Pacman came into his life.

The dog lives most of the time in Los Angeles, where Pacquiao trains, and he often travels to the Philippines when his owner works out there.  He’ll also join the boxer for fights in Las Vegas, where he stays at the pet-friendly Mandalay Bay.

Pacquiao, whose childhood dog was reportedly cooked and eaten by his estranged father, slept with Pacman at first, until he realized he was allergic to dog hair.

Pacman has nearly passed out from climbing the hills in Baguio City and scurried after coyotes while sprinting ahead of Pacquiao in their frequent jogs up to the Hollywood sign, the article reports.

Pacquiao, since his last fight in November, has been working to sharpen his focus and eliminate distractions like gambling and drinking. Pacman, while he may or may not help with that, does serve to encourage the boxer — both by setting the pace and through the enthusiasm that, being a Jack Russell terrier, he brings to the job.

“I kind of feel like he’s now the Woody in ‘Toy Story,’” said Brian Livingston, a marathoner who paces Pacquiao. “He’s become part of the menagerie.”

Other fighters have relied on dogs over the years, according the Journal story. Floyd Patterson went on 4 a.m. runs with two German shepherds named Charlie Brown and Whitey. George Foreman brought his  German Shepherd to Africa to help train for the Rumble in the Jungle with Muhammad Ali.

While Pacquiao trains in California, Noel Lautengco serves as Pacman’s dog-sitter. He stays with the dog at a Hollywood motel, where Pacman sleeps on a  bed with a pink spread. As a puppy, Lautengco says, Pacman scratched and clawed through three hotel couches that Pacquiao replaced.

Pacman is more than just a mascot, Pacquiao’s people say. He drove the fighter to train harder than ever by running ahead of the pack. “Nobody could keep up with that dog,” said Freddie Roach, Pacquiao’s trainer.

In recent months though, the dog has put on some weight.

“He’s getting old. He’s become fat,” Pacquiao said.

(Photos: Top photo from Manny Pacquiao’s official website; photo of Pacman the dog by Dan Krauss, for the Wall Street Journal)

Twenty-two-year-old Alex Wullaert, accused of choking his dog to death when it misbehaved, arrived for a court hearing in New Haven yesterday amid shouts of “coward” and “murderer.”

Wullaert, of Branford, Conn., was arraigned in New Haven Superior Court on animal cruelty and littering charges and released when he promised to appear in court for his next hearing, June 5.

He was arrested last Monday after a microchip found inside the body of a pit bull-boxer mix named Desmond identified him as the owner.

Authorities say Wullaert confessed to strangling Desmond at his home after the dog urinated on his leg and bit him. Wuallert said he put the dog in a plastic garbage bag and disposed of it in a lake.

Later, feeling regret about what he’d done, he went back to the lake and threw flowers into it, according to court documents.

Wullaert adopted Desmond from a shelter soon after his former girlfriend gave the dog up, WTNH reported. Some volunteers from the shelter were among the crowd calling him names when he arrived for his court appearance yesterday.

Supporters of Desmond, who want to see Wullaert get the maximum penalty, have set up a “Justice for Desmond” Facebook page.

For the 21st year in a row, the Labrador retriever is America’s most popular purebred dog — at least in terms of American Kennel Club registrations.

German shepherds repeated as second most popular, while the beagle climbed into the number three position, according to the annual list of the most popular among the 173 breeds the AKC recognizes.

Yorkies and shih tzus both dropped a notch or two, while Rottweilers made the top 10 for the first time this century. Those breeds rising quickest on the AKC list since 2000 included French bulldogs and Havanese.

“While the Labrador retriever has been proven once again to be a family favorite, this year clearly belongs to the beagle,” AKC spokeswoman Lisa Peterson said in a press release. “The beagle’s merry personality combined with his love of outdoor activities makes him such a wonderful family pet that I wouldn’t be surprised to see this spunky breed sniff his way to the top list next year.”

In Baltimore, the Labrador Retriever topped the list of AKC registered dogs, as they did last year, followed by German shepherds, boxers, golden retrievers, bulldogs, Yorkshire terriers, poodles, Rottweilers, pugs and Siberian huskies.

Nationally, the AKC’s most popular breeds were:

1. Labrador retriever
2. German shepherd
3. Beagle
4. Golden retriever
5. Yorkshire terrier
6. Bulldog
7. Boxer
8. Poodle
9. Dachshund
10. Rottweiller

You can find the full list, see which breeds have risen and fallen over time and get more information here.

(Photo by John Woestendiek)

When a great horned owl sunk its talons into his daughter’s shih-tzu-poodle mix, one of Patrick Evans dogs, a boxer, went to the smaller dog’s aid.

Evans stepped outside after hearing a commotion in his back yard last month. When he called the dogs, his daughter’s 7-pound shi-poo, Ramadi, came running towards the door dragging something on her back.

“Suddenly I realized an owl had its talons sunk into Ramadi and Sadie (his boxer) was trying to get it off of her,” Evans said. “When they got to the door we were able to separate Sadie from the owl and my wife pinned the owl to the ground with her foot as I ran to get some gloves.”

“The craziest thing was that the owl turned its head all the way around, you know the way they can do, and looked right at us,”  Evans told the Chicago Sun-Times. “It really freaked us out.”

Evans’ daughter, Amy, just home from Iraq, was visiting for the holidays, with her husband, children and two dogs, one of whom, Ramadi, was in the back yard with her parents’ Rottweiler, Eli, and their 70-pound boxer, Sadie.

Evans freed Ramadi from the bird’s two-inch long talons and called the Pingree Grove Police Department.

Sgt. Rich Blair, one of two officers who responded, said that as they talked to the family, “the owl stood outside the sliding glass door looking at the smaller dog as if he wasn’t leaving without it.”

Blair was able to open the door and drop a fishing net over the bird, which had a swollen left eye. The owl was by a local animal control company to Willowbrook Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center in Glen Ellyn.

Pingree Grove police said the owl attack was the third in three days, presumably the same one.

On Dec. 21, an owl attacked a small dog, leading its owner to drive her car onto the front lawn in an attempt to scare the bird away. In the early morning hours of Dec. 22, Kyle Sweet had to wrestle an owl off his 22-pound Havanese, Bailey.

Officials at Willowbrook Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center, where the owl had to be euthanized, said it appeared to have been struck by an automobile, causing head injuries that impaired its sight and might have led it to seek easy prey.

(Photos: Top photo, of Amy and Ramadi, by Patrick Evans; Sadie and Eli photo and owl photo by Michael Smart / Sun-Times)

A boxer mix  is recovering after apparently being thrown from a Toledo freeway overpass.

No one actually saw what happened, the Toledo Blade reports, but X-rays of the dog showed extensive leg injuries that looked more consistent with a fall than getting hit by a car.

“It’s too bad she can’t just tell us what happened,” said Melissa Hagemann, office and personnel manager at Maumee Bay Veterinary Hospital in Oregon, Ohio, where the dog, who’s being called Gretel, is being treated.

Gretel was spotted on Interstate 280 by Julie Cox, an unemployed Oregon resident, as she took her son to school. She assumed the dog had been hit by a car and died.

On her way home, though, she saw two other women standing with the dog and stopped.

“They said that she had actually been in the middle of the road hobbling around on three legs and they stopped to get her to the side of the road,”  Cox said. “They helped me get her into my car and I took her to my vet.”

Dr. Kevin Soncrant, who named the dog Gretel, estimated she was between 4 and 6 years old. Soncrant and area KeyBanks were taking donations for the leg surgery that was scheduled to be performed Friday at West Suburban Animal Hospital.

The Toledo Area Humane Society is looking into the incident, but John Dinon, executive director, said that it might be difficult to confirm what happened, given there are no known witnesses.

The overpass has six- to eight-foot high chain-link fence on both sides.

Once Gretel recovers, she will be put up for adoption:

“We’ve already gotten calls from a lot of people interested in adopting her after she’s fully recovered,” Hagemann said. “She has a really good temperament and is going to make someone a great pet.”

(Photo: Toledo Blade)