While researchers in several countries, including Australia, France, Germany the United States, are also studying canines as coronavirus detectors, the Finnish trial is among the largest so far
Finland has deployed coronavirus-sniffing dogs at the Nordic country’s main international airport in a four-month trial of an alternative testing method that could become a cost-friendly and quick way to identify infected travelers.
Four dogs of different breeds trained by Finland’s Smell Detection Association started working Wednesday at the Helsinki Airport as part of the government-financed trial.
Dogs “see” the world through their noses, and taste is closely tied into their sense of smell. Some veterinarians and animal behaviorists feel that this may be why pups eat items that are most certainly not food. Whether they swallow a dangerous substance out of curiosity, excitement or just by accident, seeking veterinary help quickly can make all the difference.
Here are some common materials pups have been known to eat that definitely warrant a visit to the vet.
Spoiler alert: you may never order grilled octopus again.
Myth: Felines and canines are colorblind
Although it was long believed that our furry companions had limited vision and only saw certain colors, it’s not the case. Cats and dogs have much better color eyesight than we thought. Both can see shades of blue and green. In fact, cats have way more light-sensing cells or rods in their eyes than humans do, and that’s why they can see better in low-light situations. Of course that doesn’t explain why they sometimes act that way they do.
The Almeda Fire swept through southern Oregon faster than many residents could react. Memories, homes and entire neighborhood blocks have been burned to the ground by the fast moving blaze.
Phoenix Animal Hospital owner Glen Winters remembers when he first heard the fire was moving through Ashland. He didn’t think there was anything to worry about at the time.
“I started receiving calls that there was a fire going on in the Ashland and Talent area, and we said eh it’s a couple of miles away, we should be fine,” Winters told KTVL. “As the day went on a little bit, we started getting more and more frantic phone calls and that it was getting closer and closer, and so early afternoon we decided to evacuate.”
A Democratic lawmaker wants the Pentagon to buy American when it comes to its Military Working Dog program.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut included an amendment in the 2021 National Defense Authorization Act that would require the U.S. Air Force, which oversees the Pentagon's program, to conduct a business case study on what it would take to purchase dogs from U.S. breeders instead of European sources.
"I was surprised to learn from the Air Force that the vast majority of our working dogs are actually born and bred in Europe, which raises costs and puts us in competition with other countries," Blumenthal said in a statement to Military.com on Wednesday. Bloomberg News was first to report the story.
SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Oliver the rhinoceros, King Julien the lemur, Chilly Willy the penguin and their friends are urgently seeking sponsors for their bed and board in a Chilean zoo as visitors have dwindled to zero with the arrival of coronavirus.
Buin Zoo, on the outskirts of the capital Santiago, is ordinarily one of the city's top attractions but it is struggling to stay afloat in an extraordinary year.
Visitor numbers dropped off during widespread social protests over inequality that started in October with looting and arson attacks at their fringes. The coronavirus outbreak in March shut down the zoo, capping a "bleak" year, Ignacio Idalsoaga, the zoo's director, said in an interview.
Looking like a miniature version of the dragons in “Game of Thrones,” these armadillo lizards are quite the unique little design of nature. Similar to their name, they come with an outer layering that is armored like an armadillo. Just like the armadillo, whenever these lizards are under threat, they curl up into a ball to be protected by their built-in armor. These little armored lizards like to hang out in the crevices and nooks of rocks.
They are also natives of South Africa and have adapted many ways of shielding themselves from the area’s harsh climate and predators. As a result, they’ve become quite adept at hiding. These unique little animals are lovers of sunbathing like many other reptiles, but unlike most reptiles, armadillo lizards don’t lay eggs.
Like us, gorillas live in close-knit families. They care for their own, they snuggle each other at night, and they share about 98% of their DNA with humans. What’s even more endearing about these incredible creatures is what they do when they don’t realize they are being watched.
Some gorillas actually enjoy singing as they eat, a way of giving thanks for their food.
The soft and subtle humming was captured on video by a team from the BBC-PBS miniseries Spy in the Wild 2 who used a hidden robot to observe wild mountain gorillas sitting for one of many daily meals of plant fiber.
Thirty-three pets rescued from the devastation in Beirut, Lebanon are now in Arlington, awaiting adoption.
The Animal Welfare League of Arlington posted a video (below) of the Beirut blast rescues arriving at the airport and at the shelter near Shirlington. AWLA is now seeking new homes for the nearly three dozen dogs and cats.
More from an email sent to AWLA supporters on Thursday:
The Budweiser Clydesdales are an iconic symbol of American culture. It’s one of those things that you can always identify with, whether you like the Budweiser brand or not. The commercials that they put out are always classy, well put together, and are a reminder of what the term “American” really means.
It was created as a symbol of hope for the American people. This was only aired one time, during Super Bowl XXXVI in 2002, and it didn’t resurface again until 2008 when posted on YouTube.
The ad shows the Clydesdales passing the Statue of Liberty, crossing the Brooklyn Bridge, and finally pausing and bowing in a park overlooking the New York City skyline, without the twin World Trade Center Towers, which were destroyed in a terrorist attack on September 11, 2001.
Whether you have already seen it or not, watch it for yourself. Enjoy it, and remember what it means to be an American. It is truly an honor! We fight together, we live together, we stand together.
On September 11, 2011, Budweiser remastered and created a new commercial using the same creative as the original. This newly remastered ad had a new message: “We’ll Never Forget”.
“We feel our 9/11 Clydesdales tribute ad is very special,” Paul Chibe, VP-marketing at Anheuser-Busch, said in a statement. “We were proud to re-air the spot on Sunday, the 10th anniversary, as a way to help raise awareness of the fundraising campaign for the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. The subtle changes in the ad were intended to reflect the passing of time, and the most important point, that we should never forget those lost and affected by 9/11.”
In many parts of the world, due to cultural or economic prohibitions, bitches and dogs are not spayed or castrated unless they have reproductive tract disease. However, in the United States, virtually all bitches and dogs are rendered sterile by surgery at some point in their life. This better allows for reproduction control in animals no longer capable of or not considered desirable for breeding, and eliminates behaviors and physical changes related to presence of reproductive hormones that dog owners find objectionable. The surgeries most commonly performed are ovariohysterectomy (removal of the uterus and both ovaries), commonly called spaying, and castration (removal of both testes and the associated epididymes). Castration is commonly also called neutering, although that term most correctly can be used for surgery of either gender. Collectively, these surgeries can be referred to as gonadectomy, removal of the gonads or reproductive organs.
Removal of the ovaries eliminates secretion of the hormones estrogen and progesterone. Removal of the testes eliminates secretion of the hormone testosterone. Elimination of these hormones obviously leads to decreases in behaviors and physical changes associated with their secretion, such as heat behavior, swelling of the vulva, and estrous bleeding in bitches, and mounting and roaming in dogs. However, reproductive hormones have effects on other tissues in the body and removal of those hormones may inadvertently impact those systems negatively. Other, less obvious, hormone changes also occur after gonadectomy, including persistent elevation in hormones that control the secretion of estrogen, progesterone, and testosterone. Whether these other hormone changes affect other systems positively or negatively often is unclear. To read more on this story, click here:Determining the Best Age at Which to Spay or Neuter a Dog
We all talk about recycling and repurposing, but one young artist is walking the talk by transforming broken, discarded CDs and DVDs into gorgeous animal sculptures.Sean Avery is an art teacher in Western Australia who began experimenting with CD and DVD art while he was still at university. He has created dozens of the brightly colored, sparkling sculptures since then.
A certain tick species linked to bats was found for the first time in New Jersey -- posing possible health risks to people, pets and livestock, according to a Rutgers-led study.
The study, which appeared in the Journal of Medical Entomology, identifies the tick species, known as Carios kelleyi (or C.kelleyi), as a "soft" tick. According to Rutgers, deer ticks, carriers of Lyme disease, are an example of “hard” ticks.
