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A family’s pit bull charged at a gun-wielding intruder who broke into an Oklahoma City home, scaring him off, but getting shot three times in the process.

“It is amazing, it’s amazing that he want after that guy, and that I still have a family,” family member Angelic Shoemaker told News9 in Oklahoma City.

The family said their pit bull, D-boy, saved their lives.

Roberta Trawick was sitting on the couch when a man busted in, through the front door. “He came in, pointed a gun at me and said, ‘Get down on the ground’,” Trawick said. D-boy ran in from another room, ready to attack. But before D-boy could get a hold of the intruder, the man started shooting.

“I seen him shoot the dog twice,” Trawick said. “He shot him once in the head and he was still going after him and the guy shot him again.”

D-boy was shot three times, altogether, by the intruder, who then ran away. The family said they didn’t know why the man broke in — or how D-boy survived.

“The vet said if it wasn’t for his hard head he wouldn’t be here,” Trawick said. “He’s got a hard head.”

After the original broadcast aired, pointing out D-boy’s medical bills were already over $1,500, offers of help came in from across the country.

More evidence that our dogs are becoming more like our children: The emergence of the “pet custody mediator” – counselors who help couples who have called it quits work out a custody arrangement for the dog.

Tails of the City, the San Francisco Chronicle’s animal blog, had an interview with one such practitioner last week, Charles Regal.

Regal’s fee is $350 for the first hour, and $150 for each additional hour. He tries to meet with the animal, but says he keeps the pet out of the room when that actual negotiations are underway.

“It’s not a good idea to have the animal present during the mediation because it can be incredibly stressful for them. But having a photograph of the pet in the room can be an effective way of keeping the discussion focused. I like to say that there are three hearts involved. Reminding my clients of this can often help to diffuse a potentially competitive situation.”

Most often, a shared custody arrangement is worked out — at least in the case of dogs. Cats, he says, aren’t so keen on being shuttled back and forth.

Decked out in a red, white and blue bandanna, a once homeless Iraqi mutt named Ratchet jumped out of his crate and wagged his tail at the airport Monday, three flights and two days after his much-postponed departure from Iraq.

Discovered by Army Spc. Gwen Beberg and fellow soldiers in a burning trash pile on the streets of Baghdad, Ratchet was taken in by Beberg, whose efforts to have him shipped home led to the dog being confiscated by U.S. military officials.

Later, the Army relented — its rules forbid soldiers bringing dogs home from foreign lands — and Ratchet was placed aboard a flight to Kuwait, another to Amsterdam, then another to Washington.

He will spend two nights in a kennel before flying to Minneapolis, where Beberg’s parents will pick him up. Beberg is scheduled to return home next month, the Associated Press reported. Northwest Airlines is donating the flight to Minnesota.

“I’m very excited that Ratchet will be waiting for me when I get home from Iraq! Words can’t describe it,” Beberg said in an e-mail to friends and family. “I hope that Ratchet’s story will inspire people to continue the efforts to bring more service members’ animals home from Iraq and Afghanistan.”

The dog was rescued by Operation Baghdad Pups, run by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals International. The group, which has now brought 63 animals to the U.S., says the effort both saves dogs and cats and helps soldiers who benefit from the bond with the animals.

Ratchet frolicked on a grassy patch outside the airport before heading off to Clocktower Animal Hospital in Herndon, Va., for a checkup and some shots, where he was pronounced “extremely healthy.

Ratchet, a dog adopted by a U.S. soldier in Iraq, was put aboard a plane to Kuwait today and is expected to be flown to Washington tomorrow, CNN reported.

Operation Baghdad Pups, a project of SPCA International, said once a veterinarian determines the dog is healthy he will be flown to Minnesota — the home state of Sgt. Gwen Beberg, one of a group of soliders who saved Ratchet from a burning trash pile.

Beberg tried to have the dog flown home to the United States on October 1, but the military, which prohibits soldiers from adopting pets abroad and bringing them home, confiscated the dog on the way to the airport.

Operation Baghdad Pups returned to pick up Ratchet this weekend, after the military reconsidered and cleared Ratchet’s trip. More than 65,000 people signed two online petitions urging the military to let Ratchet go to the United States.

On Sunday, private security contractors took Ratchet from a base to the airport, where he was put on a charter flight to Kuwait. Northwest Airlines is donating the flights from Kuwait to Minnesota, SPCA  officials said.

Beberg’s deployment started in September 2007 and is scheduled to end in November.

“She was absolutely miserable in the war and was really struggling to keep going every day. Ratchet turned it around for her,” SPCA spokeswoman Stephanie Scroggs said last week.

Beberg’s mother, Patricia Beberg, in a statement released by the SPCA, said Ratchet “was the savior of her [daughter's] sanity” in Iraq.

Dixie, a 15-year-old ginger cat who disappeared in 1999, was reunited with its owners, a British couple who thought she had been killed by a car.

The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) said Wednesday that the cat, thin and disheveled, was found less than a half a mile from her home in Birmingham. An RSPCA officer checked the cat’s microchip and she was returned to her owners.

“In 29 years of working for the RSPCA I have never seen anyone so excited and happy,” RSPCA Animal Collection Officer Alan Pittaway said. “It made my day to return Dixie to her owners.”

Alan and Gilly Delaney were “overjoyed” to be reunited with their missing cat after so many years.

“Dixie’s personality, behavior and little mannerisms have not changed at all,” said Gilly Delaney. “We don’t think she has stopped purring since she came back through the door.”

Finally, the pressing matter of peace between cats and dogs is getting some much needed study.

New research at Tel Aviv University, called the first of its kind, suggests a cat and dog are more likely to get along well if the cat is introduced to the family first, and if both cat and dog are still young.

Ideally,  the cat should be less than six months old, and the dog less than a year, the research concludes.

Two-thirds of the homes surveyed reported a positive relationship between their cat and dog. About a fourth said indifference best described the relationship, and 10 percent experienced fighting and aggression.

The study found that cats and dogs are getting better at communicating with each other.

“We found that cats and dogs are learning how to talk each other’s language. It was a surprise that cats can learn how to talk ‘dog’ and vice versa,” observed Joseph Terkel of TAU of the university’s department of zoology.

After interviewing almost 200 pet owners who own both a cat and a dog, then videotaping and analyzing these animals’ behavior, TAU researchers concluded that cats and dogs can cohabit happily if certain conditions are met.

Cats and dogs traditionally may not have been able to read each other’s body cues. Cats tend to lash their tails about when mad, while dogs growl and arch their backs. A cat purrs when happy, while a dog wags its tail. A cat’s averted head signals aggression, while in a dog the same head position signals submission.

What’s especially interesting, in Terkel’s view, is that both cats and dogs have appeared to grow beyond their instincts. They can learn to read each other’s body signals. Once familiar with each others’ presence and body language, cats and dogs can play together, greet each other nose-to-nose, and enjoy sleeping together on the couch. They can easily share the same water bowl and in some cases groom each other.

“”If cats and dogs can learn to get along,” concluded Terkel, “surely people have a good chance.”

Just in time for school — and just a little bit creepy  — a New Jersey company has announced what it says is the first enterprise of its kind: making drug-sniffing dogs available to parents concerned their children might be using drugs.

Launching to coincide with the back-to-school season, Sniff Dogs, LLC,  offers a confidential drug detection service — police aren’t involved at all – in which dogs specially trained to locate drugs discreetly sniff out Junior’s room or workplace.

The company’s website explains how it works.

“You set up an appointment with Sniff Dogs when you’re going to be home by yourself. A search performed while the party-of-concern is not present is a critical success factor — as not only does it reduce conflict and anxiety, it also helps to retain discretion, should a subsequent search be warranted.”

The website says the dog doesn’t actually locate the drugs, or specify what type, but just gives a sign that they are present.

It’s up to parents to ransack Junior’s room after that.

Founded by a Union County woman, Sniff Dogs uses dogs trained to locate marijuana, cocaine, heroin, methadone, xanax and ecstasy –- “as a private service with no law enforcement or government affiliation.”

In a press release, the company says the discovery of drugs can lead to a “fact-based conversation with their loved ones regarding drug use, allowing for early intervention.”

Sniff Dogs was founded by a Summit, N.J. mother, who thought other means of drug detection were “extremely limited and universally intrusive,” and that drug-sniffing dogs “fosters a more supportive and family-friendly solution for intervention.“

Branches in Ohio and New Jersey have already been established and additional Sniff Dogs operations will be launching soon, the press release says.