When Reddit user Nadtacular opened up a bag of mulch to nourish the earth of his yard, the very last thing he expected to find was a newborn squirrel but once he did, he knew the right thing to do was help the little thing recover its health. 
Never underestimate the willingness a mother has to save her children! This applies also to this hedgehog that was hit by a car and found by the good people of the Israeli Wildlife Hospital in Ramat Gan, near Tel Aviv. Even when hope seemed lost for the little thing, she had 5 reasons to keep fighting: after running some tests, the vets found out she was pregnant!
More info: Facebook
The hedgehog mom made a marvelous recovery and gave birth to her 5 tiny babies. They were all healthy and taken care of by the vets.
A beautiful Great Dane named Zeus from Bedford, Texas was named the World’s Tallest Male Dog by Guinness World Records.
Zeus has broken the previous record set by Freddy the Great Dane of Essex, England who stood at 3 feet 3 inches (1.03 meters). Sadly, Freddy passed away in 2021.
This 2 year old gentle giant stands at an incredible 3 feet 5 inches (1.046 meters).
According to his human Brittany, she’d always dreamed of living with a Great Dane, and Zeus was gifted to her by her brother. She also mentioned that he was very big from the beginning.
Ever since she was a young girl, Brittany Davis dreamed of someday owning a Great Dane. As luck would have it, her brother Garrett had a colleague who bred them.
Making his sister’s lifelong wish come true, Garrett gifted Brittany an 8-week-old Great Dane pup, who instantly became her “fur-ever” friend. …He’s been a big dog since we got him, even for a puppy. He had huge paws.
While Zeus of Texas is the tallest living dog, he still is just an inch shorter than the record set similarly named Zeus of Michigan who stood at a whopping 3 feet 7 inches. This Zeus sadly passed in 2014.
Many animals in nature have such strong maternal instincts that they’ll act as a mother to young ones, even if they’re not their biological children. Orphaned babies in need of a mother have been successfully paired with surrogate mothers, in a beautiful and mutually beneficial relationship.
That was the case recently, after one childless owl was given two orphaned chicks to raise as her own, and she was thrilled to get to be a mother.
Robert Fuller is a wildlife artist and photographer based in Thixendale, North Yorkshire, UK, who helps rehabilitate wildlife. Over the past two years, he’s seen Luna, a tawny owl, struggle to become a mother.
Despite her best efforts, none of her offspring has survived.
“Not only did her eggs fail to hatch this year, but she also lost her clutch last year,” Robert wrote.
The chicks were found on the ground in a local farm after falling to the floor. “Due to their young age, these owl chicks could perish of cold in a short space of time as at this age they should be constantly brooded by their parent,” Robert wrote.
The plan worked remarkably well: a heartwarming video shows the moment Luna finds the owl chicks in her nest, and she seems overjoyed to finally have children to mother.
In an update, Robert said that Luna was “doing a great job” raising the chicks, and has been “so tender” with them. He says it won’t be long until the chicks are too old to brood, but for now they’re in the safe care of their loving mom.
“These owlets have now been living in their new nest for a week and are thriving under Luna’s tender care. It is wonderful to watch her brood the youngsters,” he wrote.
It is always heartbreaking to see an animal kept in a cage, let alone a majestic lion. But sadly, there are still so many circuses around the world, where these magnificent wild cats are forced to live that way. For two of them, it all came to an end, after a devoted team managed to rescue them and offer them the chance to roam freely.
The moment the two lions touch grass for the very first time is nothing short of emotional.
For over eight years, Tarzan and Tanya have been forced to live a miserable life as part of a Guatemala-based circus.
The two massive felines were kept in tiny cages, and they have been untreated well all those years.
Fortunately, the Animal Defenders International(ADI) – a worldwide animal welfare group – learned about their story, and rushed to rescue them.
Though these giants are usually fearless, the two were so scared and confused when Jan and Tim, the president and the vice-president of ADI, went to rescue them.
They had endured a very tough and sad life that left scars deep into their hearts, and on their bodies as well. And these last ones show just how neglected these adorable creatures were.
Fortunately, after so many years of a sad life, Tanya and Tarzan have been eventually taken to a rehabilitation center, before being taken away to their new home – a sanctuary in South Africa.
Once they got here, the duo had the chance to step on grass for the very first time, and the moment was beautiful to behold.
Learn more about Tarzan and Tanya’s rescue in the video below!
A loyal dog in Turkey was obviously greatly saddened by the death of its owner, who often disappeared from the house, but no one knew where he had fled, until one day, writes zenoonee.The famous saying ‘A dog is man’s best friend’ is a standard phrase that explains a dog’s loyalty and is perhaps the most accurate saying ever uttered about dogs. Everyone was once surprised by the heartbreaking story of Hachiko’s extraordinary loyalty to his owner even when he renounced the spirit.
Apparently, an identical incident had also happened in Turkey!
It started when the Turk Ismail Öztürk decided to adopt an abandoned newborn puppy. He later gave the puppy the name Zozo and that is why the dog was attached to Öztürk because he took great care of him.
However, on February 10, 2014, Öztürk renounced the spirit. Many mourned his death, as did Zoza.
Shortly after Öztürk’s funeral, the family noticed that Zozo often ran away from home and returned after a short time.
However, they never knew where Zozo had gone.
One day, Öztürk’s son, Zafer Öztürk, came to visit his grave. When he looked at his father’s grave, he noticed a surprising figure lying on top of his father’s grave.
The figure was actually Zozo!
The family later admitted that Zozo had run away from home to go to Öztürk’s grave because he missed the owner so much.
Even though Zozo cannot speak how badly he missed Öztürk, he showed his love by visiting his grave everyday .
His love for his owner is simply pure and extraordinary.
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During family vacation on the St. Lawrence River in Canada, teenagers saw a newborn beluga whale washed ashore.
15-year-old Nicholas Milliard told how he and his younger brothers managed to save the animal.
They poured water in every five minutes to keep the animal from drying out.
Be that as it may, now the rescued beluga whale has a chance to survive. And all thanks to the efforts of caring boys.
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“We made a hole so that water could accumulate there and hydrate its skin,” says Milliard.
The family from Quebec immediately called rescuers and continued to care for the cub until the arrival of the specialists.
Rescuers returned the animal to the water.
All hope is that the cub will be reunited with its mother or another beluga whale will feed it.
Beluga whales feed and take care of their offspring for two years; without maternal support, the cub simply cannot survive.
Once upon a time, thousands of beluga whales lived in the St. Lawrence River, now their population has decreased to 900, and the reason for everything is the pollution of the reservoir.
It’s always heartbreaking when someone abandons their pet. Even if you can no longer care for your pet, it’s your responsibility to properly surrender it to a shelter or find them a new home. But one heartbreaking viral photo shows an abandoned little dog left tied to a fire hydrant by her former owner.
Thankfully, the dog is now in safe hands.
The dog, a tan mixed-breed named Baby Girl, was left tied up to a yellow fire hydrant in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
According to WFRV Local 5, the dog had a note explaining that the owners could no longer care for the dog, along with a backpack full of the dog’s treats, toys and food.
She said seeing Baby Girl like this broke her heart: “Cannot believe someone could do this,” she wrote, asking if anyone recognized the abandoned dog.
Kylie called the police and took Baby Girl to the Wisconsin Humane Society, who took the poor dog into their care and say that she is now “doing great” while in stray hold.
First and foremost, we are so sorry you had to part with your best friend. It’s evident just how much you loved her and we can see you did your best while struggling with your own medical complications and challenges of life. We see your love in the bag you carefully packed with all of her favorite things. We see your love in the way you secured her leash so she wouldn’t get hit by a car. We see your love in the way you placed her in the middle of a neighborhood where she’d be quickly found. We see your love in how happy and healthy Baby Girl looks. And we see your love in the note you left, pleading for someone to help her when you no longer could.
While the Humane Society points out that they allow anonymous surrenders and that they won’t let surrender fees “be a barrier,” they told the owners they were ultimately “grateful for your compassion.”
They wrote that Baby Girl is now getting lots of attention from the staff, and that she has a “bright future ahead.”
Poor Baby Girl — we’re sure she was so heartbroken and confused after being left alone like that.
But still, it’s apparent that the owners couldn’t care for her anymore, and everything worked out okay in the end.
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As she scraped cold dirt from the remains of an extinct bison, Pam Groves wrinkled her nose at a rotten-egg smell wafting from gristle that still clung to the animal’s bones.
She lifted her head to scan the horizon, wary of bears that might be attracted to the flesh of a creature that gasped its last breath 40,000 years ago.
In the type of discovery they have dreamed about for years, Groves and Dan Mann, both researchers at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, in summer 2012 found in the thawing bank of a northern river almost the entire skeleton of a steppe bison that died during the last ice age.
In adventurous work sponsored by the Bureau of Land Management, Mann and Groves have been boating down lonely northern rivers for 15 years looking for scattered bones of ice age mammals, always hoping to find a complete skeleton or mummy of a mammoth, horse, or American lion.
In mid-June, on a familiar stretch of river that flows northward on Alaska’s North Slope, they rounded a river bend and saw the skull of a large bison trapped against a willow shrub.
Upside-down skull
Groves described the scene: “We were paddling downriver, battling through a nasty squall of hail and wind, thinking about our camping spot about a mile downriver,” she said. “When the hail was just breaking up, we saw the upside-down skull with the lower jaw still attached. The teeth were really white. They stood out.”
The pair landed their inflatable canoe at the base of the 60-foot bluff. Even before they stepped out in their rubber boots, Groves spotted other bones that told her this wasn’t an ordinary site. Though this ever-changing wall had yielded many bones over the years, those were scattered remains of ice-age creatures separated by meandering river action and the crumbling and re-forming of permafrost-cemented bluffs.
Mann said their typical discoveries resemble “Pleistocene in a blender.”
“It’s really unusual to find bones that are still articulated (together),” he said. “We’ve never found anything this intact before. I think it’s really exciting when we find single lion bones.”
Groves and Mann spent the next four hours carefully removing soil from the skull. When Mann lifted it out, the spread of the steppe bison’s horns was 43 inches. The record Boone and Crockett modern bison has a horn tip spread of 27 inches.
Fairbanks expert on Pleistocene animals Dale Guthrie estimated this bison, which Mann and Groves have nicknamed “Bison Bob,” was a 12-year-old male.
After stowing the skull safely in the front of their canoe, Groves and Mann camped for the night. When they returned to the site, they saw more bones sticking out of frozen bluff sediments.
Bones of each leg were still connected by ligaments. Reddish-brown hair clung to some bones.
“When I saw the fur, that’s when I really got excited,” Mann said.
Transporting skull by helicopter
The pair worked the bluff for the next three days, pulling up buckets of river water to thaw the pieces of their rare find.
They ended up finding every piece of the animal’s skeleton except for a left shoulder blade.
With a few hundred bison parts attracting blowflies in their camp, Mann and Groves awaited a helicopter they had called to transport the bison to somewhere safer.
Shortly after their find, they used a satellite phone to try and contact archaeologist Mike Kunz, their longtime collaborator at the Bureau of Land Management. Kunz is interested in the ancient Paleoindians that once lived on Alaska’s North Slope and what might have caused both them and bison to disappear about 10,000 years ago.
Bad weather kept Kunz pinned down at the archaeological site he was digging several hundred miles away, but a helicopter arrived near Mann and Groves and transported Bison Bob to a North Slope BLM camp. There, someone put the bones in a predator-proof case.
There are too many incidents where wildlife is being taken from their natural habitat and exploited for human gain; the numbers of animals threatened with extinction keeps going up. It can be depressing to think of all the people who think the world’s wildlife belongs to them and is just there for the taking.
BBC’s Nature’s Miracle Orphans / Youtube
Meet animal hero Roxy Danckwerst who has been caring for sick and orphaned animals for the last two decades. Her latest addition is Moyo, a baby elephant, who has taken over the rescue center and home of Roxy.
Moyo, meaning ‘of the heart,’ was found by rangers after she was left abandoned on the shores of Lake Kariba, in Zimbabwe.
She was only a few days old when she had tried to cross a flooded river with her elephant family and got washed away.
He was taken to Roxy’s rescue center in Harare called Wild is Life where he has taken to his new surroundings and follows Roxy wherever she goes. Not the most convenient living situation as Moyo weighs 123 pounds.
Roxy has nursed and rehabilitated many baby elephants before releasing them back into the wild but Roxy will take a bit longer as he’s frightened of everything and sick too, according to Go Animals.
See these two adorable souls together and Moyo’s love for all things silver in the clip below from BBC show ‘Nature’s Miracle Orphans.’
A year ago, a dog named Buddy made headlines after being the victim of a horrible burn attack, perpetrated by a child, that left his face severely scarred. But this dog has never lost his spirit, and over the past few months has undergone an incredible recovery — and now, one year later, his new owner confirmed the good news that Buddy is “fully healed” and doing great.
Caution: this story contains some photos that may be distressing to readers.
Buddy first made headlines last April, after he returned home with severe burns on his face after being set on fire.
His skin was charred, and the burning was so bad it caused his eyes to be swollen shut, making him unable to see. He also had an extension cord around his neck, apparently used to hold him down.
The perpetrator of the horrific attack was later identified as a child, who confessed to setting the dog on fire but couldn’t be charged under Mississippi law, which states that no one younger than 12 can be prosecuted.
Buddy’s injuries were so bad he had to be surrendered to the Tunica Humane Society to get proper treatment. His vets were shocked by the case, and cautioned at the time that the dog had a long road ahead, stating that his “prognosis isn’t good right now.”
“It’s unfathomable that someone could be that evil,” Sandy Williams, director of the Tunica Humane Society told FOX 13. “Buddy was an extremely friendly, non-threatening dog. He followed the children in the area everywhere.”
“Buddy’s vital signs are good but, as with any burn patient, this is very much the bottom of a tall mountain to be climbed,” said Dr. Elizabeth Swanson, associate professor and veterinary surgeon, told WTVA.
“He was in good spirits, wagging his tail and very co-operative,” the Humane Society wrote in an update.
“Never once disappointing his doctors. Everyone concerned has been so pleased with the results of his skin grafts. Burn wounds are a very slow process but Buddy is excelling in his healing.”
“Now that his ears are loose from the bandages, he is much happier and more playful. I am sure he is feeling so much joy as he slowly gets his life back to normal,” Tunica Humane Society reported last summer.
“His eyes were actually open and he was very aware,” the Humane Society wrote. “In answer to your thousands and thousands of prayers, YES, Buddy can still see.”
“Buddy’s last real memory of vision was in the final horrific moments just before his face was set on fire by a child. In the blink of an eye, this dog’s whole life changed.”
Facebook/Tunica HumaneSociety
“Buddy’s whole personality has changed since seeing the light of day,” Sandy Williams, director of the Tunica Humane Society, told WREG.
“He is happy and playful and walking the halls of the hospital with a great big ball in his mouth. He loves balls. He carries them around so everyone can see.”
Buddy has been living in a foster home with Dr. Swanson, and the vet confirmed that Buddy is living his best life.
“His face is now completely healed,” the Tunica Humane Society wrote. “He no longer has to wear an e-collar and he is loving that! His days are now spent like any normal dog. Playing fetch, taking long walks, being spoiled for the awesome dog he is!”
“Buddy’s miraculous recovery from his near fatal injuries is truly a Miracle and all of his caregivers have much to be proud of.”
“Many surgeries, hugs from everyone in the hospital, and games of fetch later, he’s thriving in his foster home!” the college wrote in a Facebook post, sharing a photo of all the vet staff with the happy and healed Buddy.
You see, in Kastamonu, Turkey, it isn’t unusual for “dog owners” to abandon their pups in the dumps and mountain areas. And now that people know of Sebahat’s kindhearted actions, they’ve started leaving pups there on purpose.
It was a no-brainer: Sebahat knew she couldn’t just leave the pups. At the same time, she also knew the improbability of saving all the homeless pups right off the bat.
So instead of panicking, Sebahat set out her priorities.
She would start by going to the areas where the abandoned pups were barely surviving. She started the journey by waking up at the break of dawn every morning. She would then gather blankets, water, and food, and start the trek into the mountains to search for new pups.
Of course, the pups loved to see their savior – and not just because she brought them food and water, or tried to build them better shelter. The pups knew that Sebahat truly cared for them, and they loved her for the companionship she offered. And after being cruelly abandoned by previous “owners”, it was only right that the pups finally had happiness in the form of a loving human.
The journey didn’t end there. To this day, Sebahat visits 5 areas on a daily basis to give abandoned pups everything she has (and more). Despite her actions to help the homeless pups, Sebahat still didn’t like leaving them out in the open with no protection.
Fortunately, this sparked an idea that would begin a slow (but necessary) change. With the help of a few volunteers, Sebahat started building sheds to give the pups some shelter.
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A new study by BirdLife International revealed that at least eight bird species have disappeared in the last years. Among them also the blue parrot, so well known from the movie ‘Rio.’Pleas from the high-spirited film, Rio, for humans to care about the Spix's macaw may have come too late. As of a few days ago, the Spix's macaw has been declared extinct in the wild. Human interference in their native lands proved to be too much for this little blue macaw. pic.twitter.com/XYzru1l3NJ
— Dr. Wildlife 🐍 (@DrWildlife) September 8, 2018
The two fall in love and they have a baby in the happy ending story. Unfortunately in real life Spix’s Macaw parrots did not make it.
While many of bird extinctions occurred on solitary islands, the most recent ones were in South America, the study reveals.
That shows the dramatic impact of deforestation in those areas. According to the Red List of Endangered Species, about 187 bird species have disappeared worldwide since 1500. The causes of this rapid decline include the introduction of invasive species, hunting and deforestation, as reported by the organization in Cambridge, UK.
Nowadays, the huge urban areas expansion and global warming put an extremely pressure on wildlife with many animals forced to adapt or to extinct.
As about the blue parrots who have bright blue plumage are officially extinct in the wild.
However, some exemplars are living in captivity.
It’s heartbreaking what some dogs go through at the hands of cruel owners, but thankfully there are also people willing to save them and give them a better life. That was the story for one dog, who became trapped in a dam after being abandoned by his owners, until firefighters came to the rescue — and thankfully this dog now has a new family.
According to 5 News Online, the white dog was in the Lake Wister Dam in LeFlore County, standing on a concrete flat but surrounded by rushing water and in danger of being swept up by the current.
“When we got there, there seemed to be no way to get down to her,” Madison told 5 News. “We all stood around and watched her try to adjust in the current hoping she wouldn’t be swept under.”
They also realized the poor dog was likely thrown over intentionally, as it was the only way the dog could’ve gotten into that spot.
But thankfully, help was soon on the way. Members of the Wister Fire Department volunteered to make a rescue. After requesting the dam be temporarily shut off, they arrived by boat and were able to reach the dog with a rope.
After the life-saving rescue, the dog, now named Grace, was taken to the Poteau Valley Humane Society.
It turns out one of the couple’s rescue dogs had died just three weeks earlier, and seeing the abandoned dog on TV, they knew it was meant to be and they could give Grace a good home.
After visiting Grace at Poteau Valley Humane Society, they knew their love was for real and adopted her for good.
“There’s a look that you get when that’s the right dog. And she has that look.”
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They say that the eyes are the windows to the soul.
And if it’s true, then one little dog has the most beautiful soul ever.
Winnie the Cocker Spaniel has some incredibly gorgeous eyes – they’ve already mesmerized plenty of people online.
While she may only be three months old, Winnie has already accumulated 230,000 followers on Instagram.
This gorgeous dog has been compared to having eyes like a Disney princess, and we totally get the resemblance.
Scroll down to see more pictures of this precious pup:
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