THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

FORT JACKSON, La. — The bird bath to remove crude oil started with a canola oil rinse. The lighter oil helped break up the crude blackening the brown pelican from beak to tail, bird rescuer Rebecca Dunne explained to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar on Saturday.

The bird was still black as it went into the first of four deep sinks full of soapy water at pelican body heat of 104 degrees Fahrenheit. Even beak and pouch had to be soaped and rinsed, to keep the bird from swallowing more oil or getting oil back onto its feathers by post-bath preening.

It was a job for three people. At times, one held the beak, another held the body and a third held a wing outstretched for scrubbing or rinsing. All wore bright blue waterproof suits, yellow, shoulder-length waterproof gloves and rubber boots. Their shirts and pants were wet after the 35-minute bath and rinse — sweat, said Dunne, of Newark, Del.-based Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research, contracted by BP to lead the operation. (more…)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

FENNER, N.Y. — About 50 to 60 cattle were trapped inside a dairy barn in the upstate New York town of Fenner after the structure’s roof partially collapsed under the weight of heavy snow.

Volunteer firefighters and neighbors worked to shovel the snow off the collapsed part of the barn to free the animals on Saturday and to assess the damage.

Smithfield Fire Chief Mark Bradbury said some cattle died in the 4:45 p.m. collapse at the Stone Brothers Farm and Greenhouse. (more…)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

ROANOKE, Va. — Workers at a Roanoke pet store joined firefighters in safely evacuating puppies, cats and other pets after a back room fire filled the store with dense smoke.

Workers told The Roanoke Times they didn’t think twice about rescuing the animals when smoke began filling a PetSmart store Saturday afternoon. Roanoke fire spokeswoman Tiffany Bradbury says no injuries were reported as some 80 puppies, cats, gerbils and other animals were safely plucked from the Valley View Mall. (more…)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

MOUNTAIN HOME — A woman who failed to show up in February 2006 for sentencing on 20 counts of animal cruelty has been arrested in Vermont, Baxter County Sheriff John Montgomery said Sunday.

Tammy Christine Hanson, 42, was arrested Saturday in Sutton, in northeastern Vermont, by Caledonia County Sheriff Michael Bergeron, according to Montgomery. (more…)

MARKETWIRE

PHOENIX, AZ — At about noon today, a PetSmart Charities Emergency Relief Waggin’ trailer, stocked with at least 16 tons of much-needed pet food and supplies, was deployed from the PetSmart Distribution Center in Phoenix, Ariz., to the Santa Barbara Humane Society to assist pets who have been displaced or injured by the Jesusita Fire in Santa Barbara County. (more…)

THE DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE

MOUNTAIN HOME — Two Humane Society workers trapped 91 feral cats in and around an elderly man’s mobile home in Baxter County this week and expect to find several more on the property.

Nearly all of the cats were in such poor physical condition that they had to be euthanized, said Robby Lockeby, shelter manager for the Humane Society of North Central Arkansas. (more…)

DETROIT NEWS

Good news, Fido. Tough break, turkey: Some auto insurance companies have quietly begun offering free coverage to four-legged friends, paying medical bills for pets injured in car crashes.

But just as dogs and cats rule the roost at home, they also top the insurance pecking order. The handful of insurers that offer the coverage with comprehensive collision policies are drawing the line at cows, pigs, sheep, goats, chickens, turkeys and other animals kept for profit or food — although Farmers Insurance Group will cover ferrets, rodents and reptiles. (more…)

In this photo provided by the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Army Sgt. Gwen Beberg of Minneapolis cuddles Ratchet, a puppy she and another soldier rescued from a burning trash pile in Iraq.

MINNEAPOLIS STAR TRIBUNE

Army Sgt. Gwen Beberg isn’t having an easy year in Iraq. When the Spring Lake Park, Minn., native bonded with an abandoned puppy found whimpering in a burning trash heap in Baghdad, she wanted to make sure the black-and-white mutt named Ratchet made it home with her.

On Oct. 1, Beberg placed 6-month-old Ratchet on an Army convoy to the Baghdad airport, where he was to be flown to her parents’ home in Minnesota by a rescue group called Operation Baghdad Pups. (more…)

LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS

Manny was waiting up for Abby when she got home a little after 3 a.m. last Saturday from the Chatsworth train crash scene.

“Where you been?” he sniffed. (more…)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

AUSTIN, Texas — Hurricane Ike was about as mighty and destructive as they come, but it couldn’t break the bond between Nora Smallwood and her two dogs. She’d just as soon drown than abandon them to Mother Nature’s fury.

“They’re my life,” the 78-year-old said after being evacuated from her home in La Marque, near Galveston. “There was just no way I was going to leave them.”

(more…)

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

IRONTON, La. — Plaquemines Parish sheriff’s deputies in boats rounded up hundreds of horses and cattle from Hurricane Ike’s floodwaters Saturday.

“We woke up this morning about 4:30, and you could hear the animals yelling outside…. They were getting separated from their mothers because their mothers could touch ground and they couldn’t,” said Parish President Billy Nungesser. (more…)

MARKETWIRE

PHOENIX — PetSmart Charities has dispatched a fleet of Emergency Relief Waggins’ — each stocked with 16 tons of supplies valued at $50,000 — to the Gulf Coast to help pets displaced by Hurricane Gustav and to assist in the aftermath of Hurricane Hanna.

By coordinating relief efforts with local and state officials in Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Texas, the PetSmart Charities emergency response team is ensuring that necessary supplies for animals, and their caregivers are quickly delivered to the hardest-hit areas. (more…)

Michael Johnson and his dog Sam walk down the trolley tracks along St. Charles Ave. in New Orleans on Monday during a lull in Hurricane Gustav. (ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE/Rick McFarland)

KRISHA WILLIAMS TURBEVILLE
RESCUE IN THE ROCK

Shelters in Central Arkansas were busy Monday caring for animals from the Gulf Coast as Hurricane Gustav barreled into Louisiana.

The humane societies of Pulaski and Saline counties and Little Rock Animal Services had taken in dozens of pets temporarily as their owners streamed into Arkansas over the past few days. (more…)

MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

NEW ORLEANS — Elisa Miller dropped to the pavement and nuzzled her face against the neck of her fittingly named coonhound Hurricane.

Then she stood up outside the New Orleans downtown bus station and watched officials lead Hurricane into a portable crate, which would then be loaded onto an 18-wheeler. (more…)

Jessica Donnaud gives her two dogs a drink as her family rests after the drive from New Orleans on Sunday at a Pensacola, Fla., rest stop. It took the family more than 12 hours to make the normally five-hour drive. (AP Photo)

KRISHA WILLIAMS TURBEVILLE
RESCUE IN THE ROCK

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals helped care for 38 evacuated pets from St. John Parish Animal Shelter in La Place, La., which is now closed until after Hurricane Gustav.

The 24 dogs and 14 cats were taken to the Louisiana SPCA in New Orleans, where they will join animals for transport to shelters in Texas. The ASPCA coordinated a transfer of animals from Acadia Parish, where 23 dogs and cats will likely be on their way to the Wild Animal Orphanage in San Antonio, Texas. (more…)

Anthony Stipelcovich loads up his cats at his home in Arabi, La., on Sunday in preparation for Hurricane Gustav. (AP Photo)

KRISHA WILLIAMS TURBEVILLE
RESCUE IN THE ROCK

Central Arkansas shelters are preparing for animals evacuated from the Gulf Coast as Hurricane Gustav nears landfall in the United States.

“Trucks are picking up animals from people leaving,” said Kay Simpson, executive director of the Pulaski County Humane Society, who is in Shreveport, La., with another volunteer. (more…)

KRISHA WILLIAMS TURBEVILLE
RESCUE IN THE ROCK

The Humane Society of the United States is preparing staff and equipment as Hurricane Gustav approaches the Gulf Coast, according to a news release.

“Our entire animal rescue team has been put on standby to deploy at a moment’s notice if our assistance is needed,” said Scotlund Haisley, senior director of emergency services at for the society. “The Humane Society of the United States has deployed a core team of responders today to begin transporting our specially equipped disaster-response vehicles and rescue boat to the Gulf Coast.” (more…)