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An Oklahoma teenager has admitted he shot and killed a pit bull with a bow and arrow and posted a photo of its corpse on Facebook, but says the dog appeared aggressive.

Caisen Green, 18, who had fled his hometown with his mother after outrage over the Facebook post led to threats, was interviewed Tuesday  night by Cherokee County Undersheriff Jason Chennault.

Chennault said he will add Green’s statement to his report and deliver it to the District Attorney’s Office today. Prosecutors will then decide whether Green will be charged, the Tahlequah Daily Press reported.

Green told sheriff’s officials that the dog was one of two that wandered onto his family’s property as he was practicing with his bow and arrow.

“The pit and a smaller, non-pit bulldog came into the yard,” said Chennault. “The pit bulldog looked diseased.” Green told Chennault that when he tried to scare the dogs away the pit bull growled and began to move toward him. He said the dog ran about 30 yards after he shot him with an arrow.

Green posted a Facebook photo of the dead pit bull with the message, “For all you Pit lovers out there, here’s what happens when one shows up around my house.”

Lou Hays, who volunteers with the Humane Society of Cherokee County said Green bragged about killing when he was contacted about the post, and didn’t indicate that the animal was causing any trouble .

Hays said HSCC would push for Green to be prosecuted and receive community service at the local shelter.

Green’s post was removed after calls, emails and faxes flooded into Cherokee County authorities over the weekend, many of them demanding he be arrested and expelled from school, some of them making threats.

Chennault said his meeting with Green and his attorney had to be set up at an “undisclosed location” because of the threats made toward Green and his family.

An Oklahoma high school student who posted a photo on Facebook of a pit bull shot dead with an arrow has been forced to flee his home after receiving death  threats.

The image shows a dark-colored pit bull dead in a field with a pink arrow sticking out from his side.

“For all you Pit lovers out there. Here’s what happens when one shows up around my house,” read the post on the Facebook page of Caisen Green, 18.

Cherokee County Undersheriff Jason Chennault said the picture on the Sequoyah High School student’s Facebook page, came to his attention Saturday morning.

Chennault said that when he went to speak with Green he was told by his father that both Caisen and his mother had left the county due to death threats the teenager received.

“I understand people don’t want to see animals hurt,” Chennault said. “But death threats are not going to help the situation.”

Chennault said he planned to continue investigating.

But even if Green did kill the dog it might not necessarily be a crime, he noted.

“It’s a gray area,” Chennault told the Muskogee Phoenix. “If the dog is threatening livestock or your well-being, you can do what you have to do stop it. I’m going to do my best to get everything done this week, and we’ll forward the report to the District Attorney’s Office.”

Facebook users and others outraged by the post began sharing and writing about it shortly after it was posted, with many urging an investigation take place.

Lu Hayes, a volunteer with the Cherokee County Humane Society, said she first saw the picture last Thursday, and began sending it to different animal advocacy groups.

“A girl sent the picture to me, saying she wanted to report animal cruelty,” Hayes said.

“I started messaging (Green) and at first he acted like it wasn’t a big deal, like, ‘So what.’

“But I guess as it started getting spread around, and more people became aware of it, he changed his tune.”

Hayes said she’d like to see the district attorney’s office prosecute Green, who took the offending picture off his Facebook page after anger over it mounted.

(Photos: Caisen Green’s Facebook page)

(An update to this story can be found here.)

Attention humans: Today’s lesson comes from Tanner and Blair — two hopeless cases that, together, found some hope.

Tanner is a two-year-old Golden Retriever who was born blind and with a seizure disorder. When Sooner Golden Retriever Rescue was unable to find him a home, he ended up at Woodland West Animal Hospital.

Blair is a one-year-old black Labrador mix brought to the same hospital after she was shot while living on the streets. While recovering physically, she was timid, nervous, and unlikely to find a forever home, either.

“One day they were exercising in a play yard together and they got together,” said the hospital’s director, Dr. Mike Jones.  “Blair all of a sudden seemed to realize that Tanner was blind and just started to help him around.”

Seeing the connection, hospital staff began to board Tanner and Blair together, with amazing results.

Tanner began seizing less; Blair came out of her shell.

“His seizure disorder was really, really bad and nothing — no medications — seemed to be helping,” Jones told ABC News.  “Anytime he [Tanner] seizes he expresses his bowels.”

Tanner had been seizing almost nightly, Jones said, but  after two or three weeks with Blair, “we realized Tanner wasn’t seizing anymore.  He’s not completely seizure free but it’s not constant anymore.”

If Tanner has a leash on, Blair will pick it up and guide her friend around. Tanner, meanwhile, has had a calming influence on Blair, making the former street dog — now that she has a mission – less timid and anxious.

Now the hospital and Sooner Golden Retriever Rescue are trying to find the two dogs a home together.

“They absolutely have to be adopted together,” Jones said.  “But it’s going to take a special home with someone who understands their special relationship plus understands seizure disorder and is ready to take on the responsibility.”

Four months ago, Bobby was dragging himself through the streets of Nicaragua.

The big white and tan dog would use his front legs to get from one place to another — not that he had any place to go.

Now, due to an inspiring chain of events, he’s getting treatment in Florida, before moving to a forever home in Oklahoma.

“A perfect storm of generosity helped by social media” is how the Florida Times-Union describes it.

First, Bobby was taken to Casas Lupita, a shelter that is part of a project called Building New Hope. There, his backside was fitted with a cart that restored his freedom of movement.

They contacted World Vets, a nonprofit group that brings veterinarians to impoverished areas, which posted information about Bobby on its Facebook page.

Patti Snyder, a veterinarian at North Florida Neurology in Orange Park, Florida, saw the story and pictures, and World Vets was contacted with an offer.

“If someone can get him to Jacksonville, we’ll treat him.”

Jill Murray, a veterinary technician in Stillwater, Oklahoma, saw the post too, and offered to give the 70-pound dog, estimated to be about 5 years old, a forever home.

Money was raised to send Bobby from Nicaragua to Jacksonville, and other offers of help were made and accepted, including one from a volunteer with The London Sanctuary, a Jacksonville-based large breed dog rescue group, which offered to provide Bobby with transporation once his plane landed.

Diane Meyboom, a caretaker from Casas Lupita, accompanied Bobby on the flight and went along Tuesday for tests conducted at North Florida Neurology.

“We’re so happy,” said Meyboom. “We don’t even know if surgery is possible, but even if it’s not, we just know he’s going to get the best treatment.”

Vets are awaiting the results, and say they will do what they can to try and restore feeling and movement to Bobby’s rear legs before sending him to his new home in Oklahoma.

(Photo: Diane Meyboom sits inside an enclosure with Bobby at North Florida Neurology in Orange Park; by Kelly Jordan / The Times-Union)

Wall-E, the dog who turned up alive and kicking the day after he was “euthanized” at an Oklahoma animal shelter, has been adopted.

And, even though he’s living in a new state now, Wall-E — with help from an artist — is still raising money to build a new shelter in Murray County to replace the overcrowded one where he was injected with lethal drugs, pronounced dead and tossed in a trash bin.

After he survived euthanasia — he received two lethal doses, one in the leg, one in heart — Wall-E went on to become a much sought after dog, with national publicity leading to thousands of inquiries from people wanting to adopt him.

After months of reviewing the applicants, the shelter has placed Wall-E with a family that lives out of state and wants to remain anonymous, according to an Associated Press report.

“For some reason I had a complete comfort in picking them. They just really stood out,” said Amanda Kloski, the veterinarian technician at Arbuckle Veterinarian Clinic in Sulphur who cared for Wall-E after he was found alive. “They can give him what I can’t give him and what a lot of people probably couldn’t.”

Kloski said that while Wall-E’s story has made more people aware of the need to find homes for stray animals, overcrowding at the local shelter in Sulphur, about 80 miles south of Oklahoma City, remains a problem.

But donations to the shelter in his name, and sales of his portrait, are helping to raise the money needed to build a new shelter in Murray County.

Animal artist Ron Burns painted a portrait of Wall-E, and is donating 40 percent of the proceeds from sales of the prints.

“I believe Wall-E is still with us for a certain purpose, and that purpose is threefold — that through his ‘tail’ of miraculous survival, he is here to help his fellow four-legged friends, to remind us all of the importance of animal adoption and to stress the necessity of local spay and neuter programs,” Burns said.

 
Two dogs at a small town animal shelter in Oklahoma were partially eaten by other dogs being held there.

Town officials said two sick dogs were placed with healthy dogs in the shelter in Wewoka and  died before a veterinarian was able to visit. After they died, they were partially consumed by other dogs, KFOR-TV in Oklahoma City reported.

Mark Mosley, Wewoka City Manager said the dogs in the shelter are well cared for, but admits the city made a mistake when it mixed the sick and healthy dogs.

“We run the shelter like it’s supposed to be run and some of the moments that we might have a slip up is the ones that really kinda tend to bite us back,” he said. “We believe that we feed and water the dogs daily and treat them right.”

Mosley said the shelter will segregate sick dogs from now on, and also plans other improvements, including additional dog runs and an automatic watering system.

“We’d already planned on making changes before hand, but because of the stories and because of the negative light that it did put us in, we kind of rearranged some of our budget,” said Mosley.

The city is seeking grant money to help fund the shelter, which takes in 10 to 12 dogs per week.

Wall-E, the unwanted dog who survived an Oklahoma animal shelter’s attempt to put him to sleep, is now very much wanted.

Since his story became public, thousands have applied to adopt him, he’s appeared on national TV and $1,200 has been donated for his continued care.

Wall-E, due to overcrowding at the Sulphur Animal Shelter, was injected twice by a veterinarian with a lethal dose of sedative a month ago — mainly due to overcrowding at the animal shelter. The next day, though, he was found alive in the trash bin in which his body had been dumped.

After he was found, Wall-E was taken in by technician Amanda Kloski, who works at Arbuckle Veterinary Clinic. 

When Kloski noted the dog’s survival on a pet adoption website, it drew the attention of Marcia Machtiger of Pittsburgh, who shared Wall-E’s story on Facebook. That’s when offers for a new home began pouring in.

According to an Associated Press report, about 3,000 people have expressed interest in adopting Wall-E.

The clinic is reviewing the offers and sending formal applications to those that seem most promising.

The attention has led to some donations to the shelter, as well — about $220. Officials in Murray County are trying to raise $5,000 to $6,000 to help pay for a new county-wide shelter

Here’s a pretty amazing story out of Sulphur, Oklahoma, about a dog who apparently was euthanized, declared dead and, the next morning, was found scurrying around the trash bin in which he had been dumped.

As a result of his tale of survival, hundreds have expressed interest in adopting Wall-e, as the three-month-old dog is being called.

Wall-e and his littermates were dropped off outside the animal shelter in Sulphur. Because all seemed seriously ill, shelter officials say, they were euthanized. After being pronounced dead by a veterinarian, they were all disposed of in a bin outside the shelter, which was scheduled to be emptied that night.

The next morning, though, Animal Control Officer Scott Prall looked in the bin and saw it still held its contents, including Wall-e, who was alive.

“He was just as healthy as could be,” Prall said.

Amanda Kloski of the Arbuckle Veterinary Clinic, took him in, and word about Wall-e, named after the movie robot, spread on Facebook, leading to hundreds of calls from people interested in adopting him.

The vet clinic said they would review the offers this week and choose a permanent home.

Both the clinic and the animal control officer say Wall-e and the others may not have been put to sleep at all if Murray County had a better animal shelter, according to KWTV.

I don’t need to tell you it’s hot — pretty much everywhere — but I did want to show you how Ace, as a result of that, has changed his riding style.

On particularly hot days, which has been every day as we passed through Oklahoma and Texas, he has taken to moving up closer to the front of the car and resting his head and paws on the front seat console, so that he might absorb a little more coolness from the air conditioner vents.

This also puts his head just inches from the dual cup holders. That way, when I am mostly finished with my Big Gulp, extra large iced coffee or other mega-beverage, I can easily hand feed him ice cubes while I drive. He likes this very much.

The heat has been, far and away, the biggest challenge on our road trip — which enters its third month today.

Month two of our travels — aimed at finding interesting dog stories, seeing America, and exploring the relationship between America and dog (all on a shoestring budget) — saw us spend a little more money than month one.

Though trying to live on roughly the same amount we were paying for rent and utilities at our ex-home in Baltimore — about $1,100 — we  spent about $1,300 on food, gas and lodging, even with our ten days of free housing in Santa Fe, in exchange for petsitting duties.

That means we need to do a whole lot more freeloading as we head off on the next leg.

We will soon be making our getaway from Texas — where both of the ohmidogmobile’s door magnets were stolen, one in Dallas, on in Huntsville. We plan a quick revisit to Houston before heading on to Mississippi, then spending some time in North Carolina.

After that, we’ll head north, pop in on Baltimore, check the mail, pay some bills, and venture into New England before heading west again, on a more northerly route.

(“Dog’s Country” is the continuing account of one man and one dog spending six months criss-crossing America.)

Not that visiting my ex’s is a recurring theme here or anything, but this week we checked in on another one — a homeless cat I first encountered underneath a stairway in Baltimore, next door to a bar, took into my home after hearing she’d been kicked around some, then struggled to find a forever home for.

As it turned out, forever would be in Oklahoma, and therein lies a story.

It was January of this year, and a big snow was on the way to the northeast when Miley temporarily moved in. Word was, some of the street toughs had been kicking her, and she’d snuck into and been thrown out of the two bars on the corner before taking refuge under the stairs.

At the time I didn’t know she was a she, so I dubbed her Miles.

I didn’t want to keep the cat, but figured — with ohmidog’s vast readership — I could post a video of him (still thinking she was a he) and someone would step forward to offer a home.

For months, no one stepped forward — not the cat’s previous owner, not a future one.

But then I heard from Kitty Diacon, who saw the video, read the story and said she’d love to have Miles, who by then was Miley — renamed after a visit to the vet, where she was checked out and determined to be spayed female.

Kitty lived in Oklahoma, but as it turned out, that wasn’t too big of a problem, as she was a truck driver and was able to schedule a load that would bring her near Baltimore.

I handed Miley over to Kitty in Frederick, Maryland, back in April, and made another video about that:

Miley logged thousands of miles in the truck before she got home and began adjusting to a new family in Waynoka, Oklahoma.

This week, our “Dog’s Country” travels — which were the reason I decided I couldn’t keep Miley — were taking us to the general vicinity of Oklahoma (i.e. Texas), so we called and asked if we could stop by for a visit with Miley.

Kitty was on the road, but she called and said I should drop by and see her husband John, who, due to a job-related medical disability, is home all the time. At the time she took Miley, she said she wanted her to help keep her husband company during the day.

A few readers expressed skepticism about it — worried that, given the animals in her truck, Kitty might have been one of those nefarious sorts who take in animals, then sell them to dogfighters or for use in medical labs.

In talking with her though, and especially after meeting her, I was convinced she was a true animal lover.

Turns out John is, too.

And he seems to have no shortage of company — eight dogs and three cats (not counting those Kitty was traveling with in the truck), two turtles, an 18-month old son and three baby possums he was nursing after his older son struck the momma possum with his car.

“We’ve got a soft spot for critters,” Kitty explains.

“Miley’s pretty well adusted,” Kitty said. “She’s getting John trained pretty good.” When her water dish runs dry, Miley goes and sits in the sink until the water is turned on. Then she likes to play with stream as it flows from the faucet.

She never did that at my house, but then I yelled at her when she jumped up on the kitchen counter.

When I stepped inside the Diacon’s home, Miley seemed to remember me immediately (or maybe that’s wishful thinking). She brushed up against me and let me pick her up, something she didn’t do that often when she lived with me.

She seemed used to all the other animal life in the home — even the new possums, which John was feeding milk to through a syringe.

John, a Navy veteran who was left with disc problems from driving a fertilizer truck and who’s still fighting his workmen’s comp case, spends time tending to the animals and his son, Patrick, and working on cars and radios in his garage.

John introduced me to the rest of the animals, and I spent a few more minutes petting Miley before saying goodbye.

If I had any doubts about Miley’s new home, they were gone by then.

(“Dog’s Country” is the continuing account of one man and one dog spending six months criss-crossing America)