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Canine Forteana (Dogs' Weirdness & Wonders)

Nuneaton is the dump i was born and raised it. An utterly depressing hole.
I went to college in Nuneaton. It wasn't that bad in the early 90's from memory although I was stoned for a lot of it.
 
I drove through Nuneaton once. I think it was closed for repairs.
 
Nuneaton is the dump i was born and raised it. An utterly depressing hole.
When Richard Branson was doing the car/boat thing a few years ago, I had to deal with a very strange guy from Nuneaton. He looked like catweazle too.

But at least you had the great Larry Grayson!
 
An afternoon with Shayna Maydele, possibly the most Jewish dog in New York

In my decades as a journalist, I’ve interviewed some pretty powerful, important and, yes, even famous people. But never before have I been so excited — starstruck, even — to meet a subject, and this one wasn’t even human.

I was positively giddy to visit the Upper East Side home last week of Shayna Maydele, a small, white dog who has captured the hearts of thousands of adoring fans on Instagram. Shayna Maydele’s popularity isn’t just owing to her adorable punim — though her punim is 100% adorable, as as this committed fluffy-dog lover can attest. It’s also because her Instagram is filled with charming, authentic expressions of Jewish pride, as well as humorous takes on life in New York City.

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Leaving aside the big question of whether or not a dog can be Jewish (I say yes!) — or even if owning a pet is a Jewish thing to do — every Friday, Shayna Maydele’s account features a heartwarming “Shabbat shalom” message. The Shabbat photos often include homemade challah, other times they might feature her “Papa,” or her owner’s dad. I always let out a squeal of delight when I see the posts, and I’m hardly alone: “I wake up each a [sic] Friday and await such good posts,” wrote one commenter on a Shabbat post earlier this month. “Shabbat Shalom, Shayna!”

“My Shabbat posts get the most likes out of everything,” Shayna Maydele’s owner, Heidi Silverstone, told me.

Since emerging on social media in 2019, Shayna Maydele (whose name means “beautiful girl” in Yiddish) has garnered nearly 9,000 (and counting) fans from all over the world.

https://www.jta.org/2022/12/15/ny/a...dele-possibly-the-most-jewish-dog-in-new-york

maximus otter
 
This is well worth a watch: Snow Dogs on iplayer.

Wildlife film-maker Gordon Buchanan gets close to seven incredible huskies on a treacherous dogsled adventure through Canada’s spectacular Yukon wilderness, gaining a new appreciation for dogs and our place in nature.

Gordon arrives in Canada’s vast Yukon wilderness to try and master the ancient skill of dog sledding. Inspired by Jack London’s novel The Call of the Wild, it has been Gordon’s childhood dream to command a team of dogs out in the Yukon wilderness and follow in the footsteps of the historic Klondike Gold Rush explorers who used this trail. Gordon meets Pierre-Luc Fortin, expert musher and owner of 29 loyal Alaskan huskies, and is introduced to his seven-sled dog team.
He has trouble & makes mistakes to start with but after several days, bonds with & gets the trust of the dogs & gets the hang of it.

The dogs can cover an incredible 150km a day pulling a loaded sled.
 
A woof xmas.

A dog is believed to have started a fire after accidentally turning a hairdryer on.

Essex Fire Service said it was called to Hockley on Christmas Eve to find a smouldering blaze in a bedroom.


They believe the pet dog jumped on a bed and turned the hairdryer on, eventually causing it to set the mattress on fire.

The dog was waiting by the front door when the homeowner returned. Both needed treatment for smoke inhalation.

A dog in Hockley, Essex, accidentally switches on a hairdryer and sets a bed alight. Pic: Essex Fire Service

Image:pic: Essex Fire Service
Watch manager Gary Shinn said people should always unplug electrical appliances when they are not being used.


He said: "The homeowner was out and came back to find her house full of smoke.

"We believe the fire started because a hairdryer was left plugged in and on a bed.

https://news.sky.com/story/warning-...A dog is believed to,set the mattress on fire.
 
Give that dog a bone!

Mountain rescuers said finding a pair of lost walkers near England's highest mountain would have been "doubtful" without the team's dog.

Keswick Mountain Rescue were called out at about 17:30 GMT on New Year's Day to find a couple who had got lost while descending Scafell Pike.

The team's dog Isla found the walkers in a "steep-sided gully away from the paths" a spokesman said. It was an "excellent and impressive find", he added.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-cumbria-64150018
 
Figuring out dog years.

The 7 dog years to 1 human year fallacy was empirically corrected when a research team published their 2017 Quantitative Translation of Dog-to-Human Aging by Conserved Remodeling of the DNA Methylome study in the journal Cell Systems, laying out new methodology using DNA Methylome to create an epigenetic aging clock for dogs and wolves in relation to a human year.

nihms-1610502-f0003.jpg
Quantitative Translation of Dog-to-Human Aging by Conserved Remodeling of the DNA Methylome | Cell Systems

love how the above illustration points out that at human year 1, dogs are roughly 31-32 years old, so we're talking Tom Hanks in Splash (1984), The Man with One Red Shoe (1985) and Big (1988). Also of note in the above illustration, at around 4 human years, a dog is roughly Tom Hanks ala Charlie Wilson's War (2007), and at 9 human years is everything that comes afterwards; that's Angels & Daemons (2009), Toy Story 3 (2010), Cloud Atlas (2012), Captain Phillips (2013), Bridge of Spies (2015), Sully (2016), Toy Story 4 (2019), A Beautiful Day In The Neighborhood (2019), Greyhound (2020), News of The World (2020), Finch (2021), Pinocchio (2022), A Man Called Otto (2022), some unnamed movies and everything to come till 2024; all of that and a bag of chips can be captured in 5 human years from 4 to 9. ...

https://boingboing.net/2023/01/15/dog-years-is-to-human-years-as-7-is-to-1-wrong.html
 
Dog goes viral after ripping off letterbox and chewing through door

A dog has gone viral on social media after ripping off a letterbox and chewing through the front door of its home in Fife.

f7a5b17216753ed77fa0e8b5875f0e8d-1674820095.jpg


A stunned passer-by snapped the pooch popping its head through the middle of a chewed door on Croftangry Road, Kelty.

The picture appears to show a hole where the letterbox of the uPVC door should be – and the animal attempting to make a break for it.

https://news.stv.tv/east-central/do...terbox-and-chewing-through-door-in-kelty-fife

maximus otter
 
Dances With Coyotes,

For months, a seemingly-abandoned dog has been living in the desert outside Henderson, Nevada with a pack of coyotes.

According to Fox5Vegas, "The elusive creature appears to have not only been accepted by the pack but by some accounts leading it."

Neighbors in the Inspirada neighborhood have been posting sighting of the white dog, nicknamed Ghost, on social media. After he was spotted limping, there was concern that the coyotes might turn on their canine cousin. So citizens and the Southern Nevada Trapping Team spent days tracking him until they finally lured him into a crate. Ghost is suffering from ear and eye infections, skin problems, and a broken toe that must be amputated, they say, but is expected to fully recover. From Fox5Vegas: ...

https://boingboing.net/2023/02/07/a...-coyote-pack-is-sweetest-most-loving-dog.html
 
Our dog has two small bowls; one for 'meat' usually fish of some kind and the other for an assortment of mixed veg- any combination of carrots/celery/pasta/chickpeas/butter beans/peppers/cabbage/lettuce/beetroot/potato/peas etc.

I put this veg into a large tupperware box and keep it in the fridge for a day or two until it runs out. Sometimes it's cooked/parboiled, other times raw (not the pasta or potatoes obviously) and sometimes a combination.

I often wonder if this is giving her the nutrition she needs, but she is amazingly healthy and fit and often goes to the veg bowl first, before tackling the fish/meat.
 
Our dog has two small bowls; one for 'meat' usually fish of some kind and the other for an assortment of mixed veg- any combination of carrots/celery/pasta/chickpeas/butter beans/peppers/cabbage/lettuce/beetroot/potato/peas etc.

I put this veg into a large tupperware box and keep it in the fridge for a day or two until it runs out. Sometimes it's cooked/parboiled, other times raw (not the pasta or potatoes obviously) and sometimes a combination.

I often wonder if this is giving her the nutrition she needs, but she is amazingly healthy and fit and often goes to the veg bowl first, before tackling the fish/meat.
I give my dog (aged 17) homemade cooked meat/veg over (small) kibble. The kibble is important because it contains bone meal and other nutrients that you aren't going to get through regular people food. It is important to give them a good balance.
 
Feeling a bit woof after the ordeal. Vid at link.

Turkey-Syria earthquake: Dog rescued after 23 days under rubble

A dog has been found by a rescue team in Hatay, Turkey, 23 days after devastating earthquakes shook the region.

More than 50,000 people were killed in southern Turkey and northern Syria and thousands more remain missing.

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-europe-64817526
 
Vid at link.

I used my drone to find 1,400 lost dogs'​


A man has used his drone to track down almost 1,400 lost dogs and return them to their owners. Phil James, from Woodthorpe in Nottinghamshire, runs the dog search and rescue charity Drone to Home.

One of his latest success stories was reuniting Pudding the cockerpoo with her owner Kim Platts after she disappeared for six days.

"We want to say thank you so much for bringing this little boy home to us," she said.

Video journalist: Sarah Hawley

https://www.bbc.com/news/av/uk-england-leicestershire-64792401
 
Dogs that glow in the dark? Do they have super powers?

Dogs Living in The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone Are Genetically Distinct, Study Shows​

ENVIRONMENT04 March 2023
ByCLARE WATSON
Close up image of stray dog on cracked road in Chernobyl.


A stray dog in the radioactive zone. (Sergiy Romanyuk/Getty Images)

Nearly 40 years ago, the world's worst nuclear disaster turned the Ukrainian city of Pripyat and its nearby power plant, Chernobyl, into a radioactive hot zone – and surprisingly, decades later, a haven for wildlife.

Wolves, wild horses, birds, bison, elk, frogs, and dogs roam among the decaying concrete buildings and surrounding forests of what is now essentially one of Europe's largest nature reserves. Where humans fled, plants grew.

A new genetic analysis conducted by an international team of researchers on the region's canine clans could provide a foundation for learning just how the contamination dusting the landscape may have affected their DNA through the generations.

Scientists have long wondered what effects decades of exposure to low-dose radiation may have had on the area's wildlife.

Some studies have pointed to sharp declines in bird populations, and an increase in genetic mutations among certain species at sites with higher radiation levels. But other investigations have found little evidence of such radiation effects. ...

By characterizing distinct populations of dogs that live in and around Chernobyl, this latest genetics study provides a better basis for comparing changes in the species.

Some of these dogs may be descendants of pets left behind by evacuees, but it's unclear how many populations remain or how diverse these populations are, and if they differ from other feral dogs throughout Ukraine and adjacent countries. ...

https://www.sciencealert.com/dogs-l...ion-zone-are-genetically-distinct-study-shows
 
Man woke up to find his dog had chewed his toe 'to the bone'

A retired builder has told how he woke up in horror to find that his pet puppy had chewed his big toe 'to the bone.' David Lindsay, 64, was startled by his wife's scream as he lay asleep on a sofa at their home only to find his right big toe was covered in blood.

The bone in his toe had been fractured by his seven-month-old bulldog puppy Harley as he slept and his toe nail left hanging off. However the horror incident turned out to be a life-saver as medics later discovered he had lost the feeling in his feet due to two blocked arteries in his legs. David, a father to five daughters and grandfather to 11 children, now has no plans on getting rid of the naughty pup after it inadvertently saved his life.

https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/real-life/man-woke-up-find-dog-26729281

Pic at link for the…curious.

maximus otter
 
I give my dog (aged 17) homemade cooked meat/veg over (small) kibble. The kibble is important because it contains bone meal and other nutrients that you aren't going to get through regular people food. It is important to give them a good balance.
I had a dog that lived to be almost 18. I cooked for him that last 2 years. The place I bought the meat had a nice butcher, but one day one of his trainees served me and I had him cut up some roast (cheaper if you bought the roast and had them chop it up, instead of buying the stew meat). He asked why I needed so much and I said, "I have an old dog that can't eat dog food any more." He got upset and told his boss, "This woman is going to feed this meat to her dog" The butcher told him it was none of his business what a customer did with the meat they bought. I know, the meat was $15.00 a pound, grass fed beef. But the dog food was almost as expensive.
 
Who's a smarter boy then?

Dog brains are much smaller than wolf brains, but new research suggests modern breeding efforts have somewhat increased their relative size.

Compared to ancient dogs, modern breeds that developed in the past 150 years possess larger skulls compared to their body size. Yet scientists still don't know why.

Numerous studies have shown that domesticating wild animals – like dogs, fish, pigs, cattle, sheep, rabbits, and cats – dramatically shrinks their relative brain size.

Scientists think this is a response to a reduced need for brain power when it comes to survival.

But researchers discovered something unexpected when comparing the skulls of 159 dog breeds, including some wolves.

While the size of a wolf's brain is 24 percent larger than that of a similarly sized dog, the more that a dog breed differed from a wolf, genetically speaking, the larger their brain.

The findings suggest that while dog domestication thousands of years ago might have initially shrunk parts of the dog brain – like those related to mate choice, predators, or hunting – modern breeding has triggered some modest cognitive growth in the past century and a half.

But how?

"Different dog breeds live in varying levels of social complexity and perform complex tasks, which likely require a larger brain capacity," says evolutionary biologist Niclas Kolm from Stockholm University in Sweden. ...

https://www.sciencealert.com/dog-brains-have-unexpectedly-grown-larger-scientists-discover
 
Isn't a wolf an 'apex predator'? That being the case, all they really have to think about is 'where is the food?'.
 
I don't think breeders are purposely breeding dogs to be smarter. My experience is that they don't care about the same things that breeders did 50 years ago. The breed I know best has gone down hill in alot of ways in the last 50 years. Standard Poodles used to be the smartest of all dogs, they could be trained to do any job, though they did need a job and that was hard on people who just wanted a dog that lay around and looked good on a leash when they were taken for a walk. It was hard on the dog, who was smart enough to create it's own job if one wasn't given to it. They are hunting dogs and you can see a big difference between the U.S. standard poodles and the german standard poodles, because they are much stricter with their breeding practices.
 
Dogs: Man's best friend, a terrorist's worst enemy

Dogs: Not only are they man’s best friend, but their service and devotion to humans are, arguably, unrivaled. Among other things, they make fabulous companions, help in the detection of various diseases, provide assistance and comfort to those who need and lead search and rescue teams to lost souls who otherwise would never be found.

Our furry friends can also make excellent four-legged soldiers who serve alongside regular soldiers in combat forces across the world. To this end, dogs play an integral part in the IDF and, like all army personnel, often put themselves in harm’s way in order to serve and protect. Some even lose their lives.

In 1939, the Hagana began to use dogs to protect their villages, which often came under threat by their Arab neighbors. Their so-called “canine unit” joined the IDF following the establishment of the state in 1948.

A wave of terrorist attacks in the early ’70s led to the re-establishment of the canine unit in 1974. This unit, known as Oketz (sting in Hebrew), still exists today. It started with just 11 soldiers and operated for the first 14 years in complete secrecy, during which time it participated in dozens of covert missions.

Oketz operates with specially trained dogs, who play a significant role in complex and serious missions, including counterterrorism and search and rescue. Each is trained in a particular specialty, such as attack, locating weapons, detecting explosives, etc.

The dogs, some of whom are native Israelis and others who make aliyah in order to serve their country, comprise mainly German, Belgian and Dutch Shepherds.

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7-year-old Django fell in action in Nablus during an operation with the Yamam counterterrorism unit, May 4, 2023. (photo credit: ISRAEL BORDER POLICE SPOKESMAN)

Seven-year-old Django, for example, a Border Police dog was killed in action earlier this month, when he took part in a special operation in Nablus. He was caught in an exchange of heavy crossfire during a raid by the IDF against the terrorists who murdered Lucy, Maia and Rina Dee in the Jordan Valley in early April.

Django, a courageous, four-legged soldier used himself as a shield to protect his officers from terrorist fire: “Django prevented the lives of the fighters involved from being harmed by throwing himself ‘into the line of fire as a shield to selflessly save his partners,’ a Border Police statement said.

When one of these brave doggy soldiers is killed in action, he or she is laid to rest in the canine cemetery on the Oketz base, which has a monument in the center bearing testament to the relationship between the soldiers and their canine partners.

https://m.jpost.com/opinion/article-743540

maximus otter
 
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