CatDogBlog

Or, rather, a motorist tried to smuggle more than two dozen puppies in his minivan into the United States from Mexico, authorities said.

Many of the 28 puppies were infested with parasites, dehydrated and too weak to stand, said Dawn Danielson, director of the San Diego County Department of Animal Services. “It’s going to be touch-and-go for a lot of these puppies,” he said.

They were seized after a Customs and Border Protection officer noticed a paw reach out from under the front seat Tuesday evening at San Diego’s Otay Mesa border crossing, authorities said.

The driver, who was only identified as a US citizen, was charged with 28 misdemeanor counts of animal cruelty and cited for failure to declare a shipment, Danielson said.

The puppies, ages 3 to 6 weeks, included Chihuahuas, boxers, cocker spaniels and poodle mixes. After two weeks of monitoring, they will be placed in shelters for adoption. Poor pups, I hope they find a good owner who actually takes care of them.

A Connecticut house cat is in the dog house, accused of terrorizing a Fairfield neighborhood. Officials are now taking drastic measures to prevent the ferocious feline from striking again.

There’s no ankle bracelet or electronic monitor, but Lewis the house cat is under house arrest. He’s accused of attacking a half dozen people in this Fairfield neighborhood during a three-year span. One neighbor claimed she was attacked twice.

“His M.O. is to spring from behind you and what he does is wrap himself around your legs and he bites and scratches,” Janet Kettman said.

Lewis was quarantined at least three times by Animal Control officers, but officials said the most recent attack was the final straw. The victim’s bite wounds and scratches so severe, she had to be treated at a local hospital.

Lewis’ owner is on the defense: “Everyone who is complaining has a cat. And as you know like a dog, when cat’s face off, you can’t go near them and that’s not been brought out anywhere,” Ruth Cisero said.

The restraining order initially allowed Lewis to roam the neighborhood during certain hours of the day and night, but the cat apparently broke the rules and his owner ended up getting arrested.

Cisero is now fighting reckless endangerment charges. Even the local Avon lady, attacked last year, has filed a lawsuit against the family in Superior Court.

Rachel Solveira, a Fairfield Animal Control officer said, “I was receiving calls every single day from concerned neighbors who were in fear of their children playing outdoors.”

Labradors and dachshunds appear to waddle, while greyhounds seem to march by with a fast clip, but new research has determined that the basic mechanics behind dog walking are the same for all canines.

The discovery could lead to a better understanding of health issues related to walking in dogs, such as hip problems. Walking for both bipeds and quadrupeds is like controlled falling because, with each step, the individual leans forward and is “caught” by an outstretched limb. As a result, there is a stage when the body is high and slow, and a stage when the body is lower and faster.

“With a four-legged animal, this has broadly been observed before, but it had not been clear why and when these motions should happen,” he said. “My passive model makes it much easier to understand when and why the body moves up and down and changes in speed.” said scientist Jim Usherwood.

The model also found that walking happens on relatively stiff limbs, unlike trotting, where a dog’s legs function like springs and tend to bend more. This is true for bipeds such as humans, but he said people put more energy into extending their legs, while dogs appear to power themselves with torque around their hips, similar to how weight is distributed on a bicycle.

Dogs, particularly older, arthritic ones, often suffer hip problems because if any two bones within the hip region lose their normal position, the abnormal areas can grind against each other with each step. Over time, abnormally shaped bone can grow and inflammation sets in. Since one condition fuels the other, it becomes a vicious cycle.

Usherwood hopes his model could help to clarify how this deadly cycle begins and worsens, which eventually may lead to improved diagnosis and treatment.

Satellite tracking, helicopter surveillance and dart guns failed. In the end, it was a ham dinner and a remote-controlled net that brought a golden retriever named Sam in from the cold after two years on the run.

Until this week, “he was winning 200 to 1,” said Steve Sprowl, one of the experts who took part in hunt for the dog who earned the nickname “Golden Ghost.” Raiding garbage cans and winning handouts from sympathetic neighbors, the dog survived two New England winters, deer hunting season and a blow from a car.

Peg and Dennis Sklarski got Sam in 2004, after he was rescued from a life inside a chain-link fence in Tennessee, where he was sporadically fed and otherwise ignored. They had him only three weeks when Sam got loose. Over the months and years, neighbors repeatedly spotted Sam and called the Sklarskis, and Dennis said he spent many nights cruising the roads.

In January, experts arrived from Boston with infrared cameras and a remote-controlled net but had no luck. A friend provided his helicopter for searching. Sprowl, an investigator with New Hampshire Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, failed repeatedly to get the dog with a tranquilizer gun.

Finally, donations let the SPCA buy its own remote-controlled net, and a family that had been feeding Sam had the contraption set up on its wooded lot. Other neighbors agreed to stop leaving him food.

After five weeks, police Officer Tona McCarthy, who had devoted hours of his own time to tracking the dog, spotted Sam in the area Wednesday and hid at the lot, watching for him on a video monitor. Soon, Sam appeared.

On the video, Sam’s caution was obvious. He sniffed the air and the ground and looked from side to side. He crept toward the food dish. Normally, Sam grabs his food bowl with his teeth and drags it away to eat. This time, though, he gobbled a few mouthfuls of ham first, giving McCarthy just enough time to release the net. The far end just caught the dog as he fled with the bowl.

Sam is now at the SPCA animal shelter, being treated for a lip cut suffered while trying to escape. He will remain under observation for 10 days for any problems such as rabies. Then he can go home to the Sklarskis. They are counting on the dog’s obvious intelligence to help him recognize that it’s not a bad deal to be a beloved pet.

“The first time that I saw Sam after he was rescued, I went to his cage and I got down on all fours and said, ‘Oh, Sammy boy’ and he looked up at me, and he wagged his tail and he reached his paw out to me,” Peg Sklarski said.

The one-eyed, noseless kitten that inspired an international debate last year over whether it was a hoax is coming to a new museum of oddities in central New York. The museum founder, who believes in creationism, said the kitten is meant to launch another debate about how science and religion intersect.

The Oregon woman who owned the kitten said she turned down Ripley’s Believe it or Not! and sold the remains to John Adolfi of Granby because she liked his religious reasons for wanting them. “We didn’t want Cy becoming a joke or part of a personal collection,” Traci Allen said. “But John was so heartfelt, you could tell he was genuine and sincere.”

Adolfi would not say how much he paid for the kitten, named Cy, for Cyclops. He said he plans to have it embalmed Wednesday at a local funeral home. The kitten died in December, a day after being born. Veterinarians in Oregon said it suffered from a rare disorder called holoprosencephaly.

Cy will be displayed in a glass jar in the Lost World Museum, which Adolfi hopes to open in nearby Phoenix this fall. Other exhibits will include giant plants and eggs, deformed animal remains and archaeological finds, Adolfi said.

A woman in Australia has come up with a special system to teach your feline friends how to use the toilet.

Cat-lover Jo Lapidge has developed Litter Kwitter, which uses coloured discs and cat litter to get your pet used to perching on the toilet seat.

Ms Lapidge says her cat Doogie has now ditched his litter tray and uses the bathroom like everyone else.

It takes cats eight weeks to learn, and eight out of ten cats have managed to get to grips with the new system.