Laps for Learning PAWS Walk Looking for Sponsors

Laps for Learning PAWS Walk is scheduled for Saturday, October 14, 2006 at the Mall at Robinson from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., spotlighting Paws With A Cause Assistance Dogs. Bring the family, including the dog and enjoy watching the fun all day!
Paws With A Cause and The Mall at Robinson will be [...]

Read Full Post »

Pup gets a taste of future as therapy dog

By Margaret Smykla – Tri-State Sports and News Service – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – As she grows, Anastasia will find she not only has almost two dozen fashionable outfits to grow into, but she also has some very big shoes to fill.
Anastasia, a 16-week-old Rottweiler, is in training to be a pet therapy dog [...]

Read Full Post »

Unto, popular former Bethel Park police dog, dies

By David Templeton – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Unto, the popular police dog who retired from the Bethel Park Police Department last year due to paralysis, has died at the age of 8.
A Bethel Park K-9 officer since March 2001, Unto suffered from a degenerative disease that initially attacked his spine, leaving him [...]

Read Full Post »

NextSteps: Pets are survivors, too, and require planning

By Jan Warner and Jan Collins – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette -
Q: I am unmarried, in my late 70s, have no children and am financially OK. I never thought much about doing any type of planning because I receive enough income from Social Security and my teacher’s retirement to take care of me; [...]

Read Full Post »

In pet custody battles, courts treat animals as property

By Sally Kalson – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – In a divorce, pets are considered property and treated as such by courts in this state and others. That doesn’t stop people from loving them like family and, at times, fighting over an animal’s “custody” as bitterly as they would over children.
In one recent [...]

Read Full Post »

Dogs have nose for drugs in Armstrong County

By Tom Mitchell – Kittanning Leader Times – They can't read or write, but they are "bilingual" and they have a discerning sense of smell. And anyone who gives their bosses a bad time may find that their bite is far worse than their bark.
Three [...]

Read Full Post »

Animal-loving seniors get a hand to adopt and care for furry companions

By Linda Wilson Fuoco – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – There were the ever-popular bingo games and nutritious $1 lunches. As always there was the chance to chat with "the regulars" and maybe meet a new friend. But there was an added element one recent day at the Elder-ado Knoxville Center. There was the [...]

Read Full Post »

Boy Scout Fundraiser for Police Dog

Castle Shannon Boy Scout Troop 350 will sponsor a spaghetti dinner, 3-7 p.m. Saturday, May 13, 2006 at the St. Anne School gym, 4040 Willow Ave.
Part of the proceeds will be used to buy a bulletproof vest for Nitro, the Castle Shannon police dog. Cost: $6 adults; $4 children; free for children [...]

Read Full Post »

More hotels cater to four-legged guests

By Nate Guidry – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Three years ago, Pam Woitas of Plum searched the Internet looking for hotel accommodations for both her family and their new pet, Sandy, a small mixed-breed.

Read Full Post »

Some tours welcome pets

The Associated Press – According to the Travel Industry Association of America, more than 29 million Americans took trips of more than 50 miles with their pets during the past three years.
In addition to hotels that accommodate pets, a growing industry of tours caters to dogs.

Read Full Post »

New Maine Law Shields Animals in Domestic Violence Cases

By PAM BELLUCK – NYT – Susan Walsh told Maine legislators a chilling tale in January. She said she had wanted many times to take her two children and leave her husband, ending a relationship she found frightening and controlling.
Susan Walsh with her dog Lazlo and some of her farm animals in Ellsworth, Me. Ms. [...]

Read Full Post »

From Lap to Lap, via Internet and Airline

By TRACIE ROZHON – NYT – If you want something badly enough, you'll find a way to get it. Even a pedigreed dog.
We bought Reilly, our Irish terrier puppy, over the Internet. She was shipped in by Northwest Airlines in a tiny plastic carrier, arriving in upstate New York on a bitterly cold night in [...]

Read Full Post »

‘Pets in America: A History,’ by Katherine C. Grier

By ALIDA BECKER – NYT – In 2004, 36 percent of the households in the United States included children. More than 60 percent included pet animals. Is it any wonder, then, that American pet owners, as Katherine C. Grier reports, "now routinely describe their animals as their best friends or as family members"? The word [...]

Read Full Post »

A mixed dog in wolf’s clothing

Breeders take a walk on the wild side to create a bloodline that’s both cuddly and dangerous – By Joe Garner – Rocky Mountain News – The eyes track you. Wary, primitive eyes. Luminescent golden eyes.
The eyes of a wolf in the guise of a dog. The animal’s bloodline seems to flow simultaneously cuddly and [...]

Read Full Post »

It’s a dog’s life for pampered pets

April E. Clark – Glenwood Springs Post Independent Staff – There’s an aging golden retriever in the valley with a dye job to die for.
And that’s just a sampling of the lengths some pet owners go to when pampering their babies – yes, “babies.”
Today, Fido stays dry with a water-shedding raincoat, and warm with a [...]

Read Full Post »

So You Think You Can Just Adopt a Dog?

By ANNA BAHNEY – New York Times – Almost as soon as Michele Pusateri and her two daughters chose a black-and-white terrier at a humane society shelter near their home in South Pasadena, Calif., they were told they did not qualify to own the dog.
Mrs. Pusateri took her daughters, Mira and Zoe, back twice more [...]

Read Full Post »

Offering unconditional love, pets are special to clergy, religious

By Claudia Mathis – Catholic News Service – SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Paddy, a 12-year-old black Labrador retriever, works in public relations at St. Joseph’s Church in Endicott, N.Y., in the Diocese of Syracuse.
“Paddy’s always there to greet people as they enter church,” said Father Jim Serowik, the pastor. “She’s also a four-legged alarm – she [...]

Read Full Post »

Blind author shares message about overcoming challenges

By Sandy Trozzo – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – Many of the children filing into the auditorium at Hance Elementary School pointed and commented about the "doggie" lying on the floor.
But Handley, a guide dog, was there to work, and her owner, author Sally Hobart Alexander, was there to talk about how she gets her story ideas [...]

Read Full Post »

Courthouse dog helps kids relax

The Associated Press from The Cleveland Plain Dealer – Delaware, Ohio – A juvenile court judge has come up with a way to help ease the concerns and tension for upset youngsters who come into his chambers to talk about grown-up things such as custody battles or child abuse.
The judge's big yellow Labrador retriever helps [...]

Read Full Post »

Castle Shannon Scouts to finance protection for K-9

By Margaret Smykla – Tri-State Sports and News Service for the Post-Gazette – A week after Nitro, Castle Shannon's newest police dog, started on the job, he and handler Officer Jeff Recker were called to neighboring Whitehall. They were asked to find a man who had run into the woods after breaking into his former [...]

Read Full Post »

Training programs build business skills among the blind

By Seth Sutel – The Associated Press – Losing his sight in a car crash 11 years ago didn't stop Danny Novielli from going to college to study business. With the help of various "adaptive technologies," such as a Braille note-taking device and software that reads text that appears on computer screens, he wound up [...]

Read Full Post »

A place for pet owners to grieve: Bridgeville crematorium helps soften the loss

By Dan Gigler - Pittsburgh Post-Gazette – A CD of soothing acoustic guitar music plays in the background. The wall-sized photo of a serene forest landscape provides a calming backdrop. Comfortable couches in tasteful, conservative tones, embrace the mourning. A box of tissues is at the ready.It is almost a perfect place to grieve.
It’s also the [...]

Read Full Post »

Joy, love spread by instinct by this canine volunteer

By Margaret Smykla – Tri-State Sports and News Service – When Athena entered the Castle Shannon home of a terminally ill 5-year-old girl as part of Three Rivers Hospice’s volunteer pet therapy program, the Rottweiler went straight to the girl’s bedroom in the back of the house and jumped on her bed. From then on, [...]

Read Full Post »

Friends….or Food?

Dog & Cat Eating in China – Animals Asia Foundation – Whilst some countries in Asia such as Hong Kong, the Philippines and Taiwan have banned the practice of dog eating, evidence shows that in China, the biggest dog eating country in the world, it continues to thrive.  

Read Full Post »

Helping families cope with loss of pet

By Kristy Graver, The Signal Item – When Mark and Kristine Ferrans lost their beloved golden retriever, Kelly, to cancer last spring, they decided to give her a heartfelt send-off by scattering her ashes in a grassy field where she used to run wild and free.
After researching Chartiers Custom Pet Cremation in Bridgeville, the Wexford [...]

Read Full Post »

Therapy dogs stir up happy memories

A therapy dog pushes his friendly nose onto the lap of a resident of a personal care facility. As a smile cross the woman’s face, she pets her canine visitor’s neck and recalls, “I had one that looked a lot like this, you know.”
By Jan Woodard – The Blairsville Dispatch – INDIANA – That scene [...]

Read Full Post »

Group pioneers dog-assisted reading program

By Gina Delfavero – Blairsville Dispatch – INDIANA – Teaching a child to read is a daunting task. But teaching a child to enjoy reading is an undertaking all of its own.
One Indiana County group believes it may have a solution to both of those problems–Reading Rascals, a one-on-one session of reading aloud to…a dog? [...]

Read Full Post »