Category Archives: Dogs

Time magazine has issued a list of its Top 10 Heroic Animals, with four dogs amongst them including the Japanese dog who refused to leave its injured friend in the aftermath of the tsunami  (seem my post on the loyalty of one dog to another).

The other dogs on the list are Trakr, a Canadian police dog who in a six-year career found more than $1 million in contraband.  In September 2001, he worked at the wrecked World Trade Center and found the last survivor at the site.  After two days of working at the Center, Trakr collapsed from smoke inhalation and exhaustion and returned to Canada to recuperate.

Stubby was a stray dog who was adopted by Private J. Robert Conroy who  named him Stubby because of  his short tail.  Private Conroy’s regiment were training for World War I and the dog was allowed to stay because he boosted morale.  Stubby learned a modified salute where he put his right paw on his right eyebrow.   The dog traveled with the regiment to France, surviving gas attacks and providing an early warning when gas was coming.  He served in 17 battles.

The fourth dog on the list is Togo.  In 1925, the town of Nome, Alaska was struck by diptheria.  Because Nome was so isolated, planes and ships could not get the serum there and a decision was made for multiple sled dog teams to relay the medicine across the land.  Togo was the sled dog who did most of the work, facing winter storms, a journey of 200 miles that included a swim through the ice floes in Norton Sound.

The other animals on the list include two horses, two cats, one pigeon and one dolphin.  Read the full stories here.

Kathleen Crisley, specialist in dog massage, rehabilitation and nutrition/food therapy, The Balanced Dog, Christchurch, New Zealand