Black Lab Archives - i Still Love Dogs

Dolphin-Watching Tour Captain Rescues Senior Dog Off Florida Coast

On a typical cruise, passengers aboard Susi Herrington’s sailboat get to see plenty of dolphins off the coast of St. Pete Beach in Florida.

“We go out, look for dolphins, but we actually let the dolphins come up to the boat — we don’t go chasing them or anything because they’re in their natural habitat,” Herrington, who works for Dolphin Landings Charter Boat Company, told Bay News 9.

But as they scanned the ocean for dolphins July 11, Herrington and her passengers were shocked to see a senior Black Lab treading the water, obviously in distress.

Herrington lowered herself down into the water and swam to the dog. Holding his head above the water, she swam with him to a dock. She told Bay News 9 she couldn’t believe she was actually able to lift the large, heavy dog out of the water and up to safety.

“I don’t know how I did it,” she said. “When I pulled him up, his body just flopped out. All his legs were out underneath him. He eventually got up, shook, and I thought, ‘Well, he’s got to live around here somewhere.'”

Herrington didn’t have to try to locate the Black Lab’s owner. The dog lead her to his house — next door to the dock.

“I knocked on the door, and that’s when I asked the lady, ‘Is this your dog?’ and she was just in tears — literally tears,” Herrington told Bay News 9.

The lucky dog’s name is Sam. He’s 12 years old and has cataracts that affect his ability to see clearly. His owner, Mary Doherty, was on the phone when Sam apparently fell over a seawall and into the water.

“I couldn’t believe it, because our dog, he won’t even leave the yard,” Doherty told Bay News 9. “He will not jump into the pool. He’s never jumped into the water, so this was pretty shocking for me, and needless to say I was pretty upset about it.” She said she is forever indebted to Herrington for preventing what could easily have been a tragedy.

Like most heroes, Herrington is downplaying her life-saving actions. “I was just doing my job,” she told Bay News 9. “Just doing what I’ve been trained to do all these years of working on boats.”

Photo credit: Barbara L. Hanson

Reporter Reunites Senior Lab with Elderly Dog Dad after California Wildfire

As the so-called Valley Fire wildfire raced toward his Lower Lake, Calif., home six days ago, 76-year-old Lawrence Ross had little time to evacuate.

He grabbed what he could, but had to leave behind his senior Black Lab, Thumper.

“I think my house is okay, but I don’t know, and my dog is there, and my goats and horses and alpacas,” Ross tearfully told Associated Press reporter Brian Skoloff yesterday at an evacuation center.

“My dog, my dog.”

Ross said he’d had a nightmare that his house was burning down, “and I could hear her screaming as she burned.”

Skoloff asked Ross to show him where his house was on a map. The reporter then drove 10 miles, past burned terrain and downed power lines, to the address. He couldn’t believe what he saw.

The grounds around the house were burned, but the house was still standing.

“Two horses grazed on hay in the yard. The alpacas stared at me from their pen. Goats scurried about like nothing had happened,” Skoloff wrote. “But there was no sign of Thumper.”

For an hour, Skoloff walked around the property, calling out Thumper’s name. The dog finally appeared, covered in soot and wagging her tail. She had been hiding in a crawlspace under the house.

“She leaped into my lap, licked my face, then rolled over on her back as I rubbed her belly and I cried,” Skoloff wrote.

“‘Good girl, Thumper!’ I kept telling her. ‘You made it!'”

There were more tears when the reporter called Ross to tell him the good news.

Skoloff drove Thumper to the evacuation center to be reunited with her dog dad.

“I barely had the back door open when Thumper pushed her way out and ran toward him, her entire body wagging now,” he wrote.

“I can’t believe it,” Ross kept saying.

Here are some ways you can help pets displaced by the devastating wildfires in Northern California.

Photo via Facebook

Electronics-Sniffing Black Lab Helped Bust Jared Fogle

Former Subway spokesmonster Jared Fogle, as you’ve probably heard, was taken into custody earlier this week for paying for sex with minors and possessing child pornography. Incriminating evidence discovered by a 2-year-old Black Lab named Bear helped lead to Fogle’s arrest.

Bear is currently one of only four dogs in the United States trained to sniff out electronic media storage devices such as computers, iPads and memory cards.

After the FBI raided Fogle’s house in Zionsville, Ind., last month, Bear was summoned to do his job.

“I had no idea until that morning of what house I was actually going to,” his trainer, Todd Jordan, told WISH. “Once I found out who it was, yeah, it makes a little more nerve-racking for us.”

Bear discovered a hidden flash drive in Fogle’s house that was “vital to the investigation,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven Debrota told RTV6.

This was Bear’s fifth investigation for the Indiana Crimes Against Children Task Force. Jordan told FOX59 last month that electronics detection dogs like Bear are especially helpful in child pornography investigations.

“You think about investigators going into a house and trying to find a micro SD card that is as big as a fingernail. It will take investigators hours, especially if someone is trying to hide it,” he said.

Bear was “one of the sweetest dogs I’ve ever worked with,” Jordan told WISH. He trained Bear to detect electronic media storage devices a year ago. The process took about four months.

“It’s just like any other K-9 training, like with the narcotics or explosives or anything,” Jordan said. “You get the dog used to the odor and reward them as they indicate on it.”

When Bear finds something, he sits next to it. Jordan rewards him with a treat from a pouch he keeps in his pocket.

Jordan’s days of working with Bear have come to an end, however. Bear recently moved to Seattle to join its police department.

“It’ll be bittersweet,” Jordan told WISH. “It’s sad to see him go, but the type of work he’s doing, it’s very rewarding.”

Jordan is now training two more dogs to detect electronic media storage devices. Hopefully they will follow in Bear’s footsteps and help bust more child predators.

Photos via Twitter

Black Lab Attacks Tucson Boy and His Pit Bull

Last week in a Tucson neighborhood, as a 14-year-old boy on a skateboard was being pulled along a sidewalk by his leashed Pit Bull, a teenage girl across the street was trying to walk her black Lab, but having difficulty keeping him under control.

The moment the Lab saw the Pit Bull, he broke free and started biting the boy and his dog. The boy suffered eight puncture wounds on his fingers and hands, according to Tucson News Now, which didn’t mention the Pit Bull’s condition.

“I think if a dog is mean enough to break a leash, break free from a leash and attack another dog while walking with a kid…I don’t know,” Zack Marcus, the boy’s dad, told Tucson News Now. “I love dogs, but that’s a bad dog.”

When police officers finally arrived, Marcus said they were more interested in what the Lab’s owner had to say about the incident. Fortunately a surveillance camera on a nearby house captured the entire attack. The Lab can be seen being pulled away by his back legs, his teeth still clamped on the Pit Bull’s face.

“To me that screams education and responsible pet ownership,” Justin Gallick of the Pima Animal Care Center told Tucson News Now. “From my understanding, a pet was being walked by somebody that’s underage and maybe didn’t have the physical capacity to walk such a dog.”

The Lab was taken away by animal control and is under a rabies quarantine for 10 days. He will be given a dangerous dog evaluation. If he is found to be dangerous, he and his owner may have to comply with strict confinement, licensing and insurance requirements. If the owner can’t meet those requirements, the Lab could be euthanized.

The story by Tucson News Now, one of the only news sources reporting the incident, starts with this:

“A local dog attack involving a pit bull – but this incident doesn’t start or end the way one might think.”

Oh, because based on negative stereotypes, one might think the Pit Bull was the aggressor?

The headline reads, “Local boy, pit bull attacked by neighbor’s dog,” not bothering to mention the breed of the attacking dog. But Tucson News Now does deserve props for covering the story at all.

“I have Pit Bulls, big ones,” Marcus said. “And we get the bad rap because of the Pit Bull. My dog’s never done that.”

Vet Removes 62 Hair Bands, Undies and More from Lab’s Stomach

Tiki, a black Lab, had no appetite last week. When she started vomiting and having diarrhea, her dog mom, Sara Weiss, took her to the Good Shepherd Veterinary Hospital in Mars, Penn.

Dr. Hisham Ibrahim took X-rays and noticed a large, unusual mass in Tiki’s stomach.

Tiki was rushed into surgery. Dr. Ibrahim “started pulling handfuls of different items out” during the two-hour operation, vet technician Emily Cottle told WTAE. “It was quite an experience to see.”

Among those items: 62 hair bands, eight pairs of underwear, four rubber bands and one bandage.

Dr. Ibrahim compared the surgery to a magician pulling scarf after scarf out of a hat.

“I found this hair band attached to another hair band, to another one, to another one, and to other things again,” he told WTAE. “But, thank God, we were able to pull through, and Tiki’s recovered very well.”

Weiss said Tiki had previously eaten a Nerf dart, but was able to pass it, er, naturally.

Dr. Ibrahim recently had to surgically remove 15 pacifiers from another dog’s stomach.

“I was there for the pacifiers and many other different items, but not something that big (as Tiki’s collection),” Cottle told WTAE.

In May, a Belgian Malinois named Benno ate 23 live rifle rounds. Like Tiki, after surgery, Benno lived to bark about it.

Photo via Facebook

What’s the weirdest thing your dog has ever eaten? Please leave a comment below.