More on Bradley, the Dachshund Who Sacrificed Himself For His Humans

In a follow-up to this week's story on Bradley, the Michigan Dachshund who fearlessly gave his life for his humans when a bear approached them, here's another interview with the humans in his life.  Via UpNorthLive.

Brave Dachshund Sacrifices Himself For His Humans

We're not quite sure what to say about this story except that the phrase "Bold to the Point of Brashness" certainly defines this Michigan Dachshund named 'Bradley,' who fearlessly gave his life for his humans when a bear approached them. Via 9and10 News:

A dog being called a hero tonight, credited with saving the lives of two men when they were caught off guard by a bear. Bradley, a Dachshund, put up a fight against the bear on Saturday in Oscoda County.
While he didn't survive, the two men who were with him say because of him they did. The two men from downstate were visiting their friend in Comins. They say despite the large bear being feet away from them, it didn't scare the small dog one bit. "We came out in the golf cart, and this bear was standing right there," Mike Hodges recounts.
Hodges, who suffered a stroke just three weeks ago, says he and his friend Jeremy, didn't notice the bear right away. Bradley's owner, says the dog certainly did. "Bradley jumped off the golf cart and attacked the bear, and the bear grabbed Brad and took off," owner John Force explains. "He grabbed him up and took off running through the woods with two other bears following 'em," describes Mike.
They believe the bear was startled by Mike, Jeremy, and Bradley, and was trying to protect it's cubs, and when the bear reacted, Bradley was simply trying to protect the two men he had only just met that day.
"I think when Brad saw it, he did what he would normally do, jumped right off it and went at it. I wouldn't have ran after that bear with a knife as big as I am, and little Brad- 4, 5 pounds- he don't have a filter for fear," John says.
The two men eventually scared the bear away with a stick and loud noises. They brought Bradley back to the house, and the dog was rushed to an animal hospital, where he died. "He was a warrior," John speaks highly of his dog, "if he would have died any other way than that, you know, it was a noble death the way I look at it."
John believes his dog's fearlessness changed the outcome of what could have been an even more tragic situation. "Mike being in the medical condition he's in, I don't think he would have been alert enough to get away from the bear. I think Brad did save them from getting mauled at least," says John.
John says he and his family are proud of what their dog did, and know Bradley would do it again. "It ain't the size of the dog in the fight, but the fight in the dog that counts, and that sums it up for Bradley."

He was Handsome.  He was Bradley.

Blind, Deaf, 3-Legged Dachshund Saves Family From Fire

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He may not have been able to see it, hear it, or even run very well from it, but he could smell it and feel it's destruction, and that was enough for our latest Dachshund Hero to wake up and save his family from the fire that destroyed their home.  This blind, deaf, 3-legged rescue boy who hails from Grady County, Oklahoma, goes by the name of 'True,' and was the dog that nobody wanted.  Boy did he return the favor of his humans for being there for him.  Video and words words via NBC:

Katie Crosley has endured her fair share of hardship.
Her son, Jace, was born with a heart defect.
Crosley said, “We spent four weeks in NICU. When it rains, it pours, I guess.”
Early Sunday morning smoke and flames consumed their Grady County cabin.
Katie and Jace woke up to a wailing Dachshund.
A genuine miracle, she believes, considering “True,” their pet dog is blind, deaf and only has three legs.
“I thought he had to go outside,” she said. “When I opened the door, it was a wall of flames.”
An electrical short ignited a fireball on the front porch, barricading Katie and Jace inside.
They navigated through the smoke and out the back.
The fire victims lost everything, including all the baby supplies they had just collected.
“All his stuff from NICU, medical records, all gone,” she said. “So that’s the hardest part, having all that stuff from when he was little.”
There is little left here and yet, Katie is grateful for so many things, mostly the disabled Dachshund nobody wanted.
She said, “We’re thankful for him. This could have been a bad deal.”
An animal rescue that somehow returned the favor.

Thanks to all the good news-hounds - 'Sasha' in Monterey, California, and 'Ellie' and 'Parker,' - who sent us links to the story while we were away eating Turkey!  Here are some pics of some of these beautiful news-hounds:

Ellie

 

 

Parker

Our Dachshunds, Our Heroes

Meet our latest Dachshund Hero, 12-year-old red smooth 'Buster,' who hails from Grovetown, Georgia.  When his human, Lelia Boatright, went into insulin shock at 3 in the morning, Buster let the whole house know and saved her life!  Excerpt from the Columbia County News-Times:

“He started howling, that’s what woke me up,” said Les Boatright, of Grovetown. “The dog let us know that something was wrong.”
At about 3 a.m., Buster alerted Boatright that his wife, Lelia, was having a medical crisis. Lelia Boatright, who has been an insulin-dependent diabetic for more than 35 years, was in insulin shock.
Her blood sugar dropped so low that she lost consciousness and nearly died.
“The dog started causing a ruckus,” said Les Boatright, who sleeps in another room because of a ruptured disc in his back. “I went in there to check on what was wrong with the dog. That’s when I found her like that. I thought she was dead.”
He said the mattress was soaked in sweat, and his wife’s eyes had rolled back in her head. She had only a weak pulse and shallow breathing.
Lelia Boatright said she has a glucose monitoring system implanted under her skin that works with an insulin pump.
When her glucose monitor detects that her blood sugar is high or low, it sends a message to the pump, which signals Lelia Boatright. She then has to hit a button to dispense the medication that keeps her blood sugar from skyrocketing.
The last thing she remembers is having dinner and checking her blood sugar – and everything was fine.
She took what she believed was her typical insulin dose and went to bed.
“I just, somehow, hit the wrong button and gave myself 10 units (of insulin) instead of the one or two that I usually take to get (my blood sugar) down,” Lelia Boatright said. “It was the maximum amount my pump is set for.”
She said she woke up in the ambulance, dazed and confused, but was eventually able to answer the medical personnel’s questions. She never realized what went wrong until she was in the hospital and checked the history on her insulin pump.
If Buster hadn’t alerted Les Boatright, his wife likely would have died by morning.
The Boatrights actually gave Buster to their son, Joseph, on his 8th birthday. The now-20-year-old is finishing his first year away at college, so Buster has taken to sleeping with Lelia Boatright.
“God has a plan for everything,” she said. “And it just wasn’t my time yet.”


We're so proud of you Buster!  Read more of this story at the Columbia County News-Times.

Heroic Canadian Dachshund Inducted Into Purina Hall Of Fame

Way to go 'Bree!'

As one of the longest running pet recognition programs in Canada, the Purina Animal Hall of Fame has recognized the life-saving heroics of pets and service animals for more than four decades. Since its inception in 1968, 155 animals have been inducted - 128 dogs, 26 cats and one horse.  Yesterday, a smooth chocolate Dachshund named 'Bree,' who hails from Blissfield, New Brunswick, was one of four animals, three dogs and one cat, to be inducted for 2012.  We're so proud of you Bree!  Excerpt from Canada Newswire:

Last September, three days before owner Michele Gilks' 50th birthday, Bree, her two-year-old Dachshund, tried to wake Michele up in the middle of the night by putting her snout in Michele's mouth, licking her face and frantically digging next to her. When Michele finally awoke, she felt an overwhelming "drowning" feeling and began gasping desperately for air. Bree's antics also woke Michele's husband who called an ambulance at once. When the paramedics arrived, Michele was put on oxygen and rushed to the hospital due to her dangerously high blood pressure. At the emergency room, Michele was diagnosed with a severe case of sleep apnea - a potentially life-threatening condition that causes a person to stop breathing during sleep. This wasn't the first time Bree had woken Michele up from sleep in the middle of the night and now she understood why: Bree was helping Michele breathe whenever she stopped. If Bree hadn't been watching over Michele that night, she would have died in her sleep from lack of oxygen. Today, Michele is receiving treatment for her sleep apnea and Bree no longer wakes her during the night. Michele feels like she's been given another chance at life and she's eternally grateful to Bree for that gift.

"I was unaware that I had severe sleep apnea, but Bree sensed something was wrong with me immediately. Without her persistence to wake me from sleep apnea episodes, especially the severe episode last September, I wouldn't be here today," said Michele Gilks, owner of the two-year-old Dachshund. "She is my personal hero, and we're so thrilled that Bree is being recognized for her heroic efforts by the Purina Animal Hall of Fame."

Read more at Canada Newswire and visit the Purina Animal Hall of Fame to read past honoured stories. 

Police Dispatcher Helps Dachshund Owner Save Dog's Life With Heimlich Maneuver

dispatcher 12.25.11 by Bruce MacLeod

(Click to play 911 call).  Imagine that it's a festive Christmas morning and you're giving your Dachshund her Christmas present when all of a sudden she starts choking on a piece of the gift or wrapping paper.  She's going to die.  You frantically call 911 who won't send an ambulance for an animal.  Oh My Dog. 
Thankfully, this Royal Oak, Michigan 911 operator was able to help with Heimlich Maneuver instructions.  Harrowing. Via the Daily Tribune.
Make sure and learn how to do the Heimlich Maneuver on your dog so this never happens to you!

Public Safety Aide Stacey Sheldon, our Hero.

Brave Dachshund Herds Swans From Danger!

Meet 'Alfie,' an incredibly handsome and also quite brave black and tan longhair who hails from Coltishall, a village on the River Bure, west of Wroxham, in the English county of Norfolk.  Alfie was on "walkies" with his human when they encountered two swans who were dangerously close to the road during the busy "tea-time rush hour."  Excerpt from EDP24:

Realising that the birds would get hit and could cause a serious accident, Ms Barchi (Alfie's Mom)decided to try and drive them back towards Colitshall Common and their River Bure home.
And that’s when Alfie, seven inches high and 30ins from nose to tail-tip, showed his pluck.
“I said: ‘Come on Alfie, we’ve got to do something about this’ The traffic was very heavy and it was dark. The swans were very big guys but he was up for it. He stood his ground. He didn’t try and hide behind me,” said retired teacher Ms Barchi.
“The swans didn’t take any notice of me but when they saw the dog they started hissing like fury at him. He wasn’t going to back off. He took one and I took the other and between us we herded them away from the road. It took 15-20 minutes and it was quite dodgy,” Ms Barchi added.
She is familiar with the neighbourhood resident swans, a pair and their three cygnets, and knew that straying so far from the river was very unusual behaviour.
Fearing one of them might be ill and its mate was keeping it company, she phoned the Wroxham-based waterbird rescue service.
But when a representative arrived, he told Ms Barchi that both were male and the ‘intruder’ was being seen off by the resident father.
The rescue expert had wrapped the visiting swan in a blanket and taken it away to release on Wroxham Broad, said Ms Barchi.

Alfie is our hero!  See more photos of the good-looking guy at EDP24. 

Meet Pete The Wonder Dog Who Saved His Family!

Boy are we proud of this super smooth black and tan boy named 'Pete,' the Oklahoma City, Oklahoma hound who saved his whole family from a house fire on Sunday.  Thanks so much to Kathy J. Fuller for writing in with the news:

Dear Joey and Maggie,

Pete saved the lives of his owners and their niece when he awakened them from sleep when the house was on fire!  Pete is a hero! 

Here's the remarkable (rebarkable?) scoop from KFOR.com:

A metro family says their small dog saved them from a house fire. Jennifer and Ricky Coffman say they were sleeping when a fire engulfed their home on the 13000 block of SE 71st Sunday Morning.
Ricky says their dog, Pete, came running through the house barking.
"(The fire) It came from the outside in, didn't get time for the fire alarms to go off," Ricky Coffman said.
His wife says Pete was their fire alarm.
The dog was able to wake up the family and within moments everyone was out of the burning house.
"Pete the wonder dog, he saved us," Jennifer Coffman said.
The Coffman's say their home was a total loss.

Way to go Pete.  Read about more Dachshund Heroes.

A Year Later: Dachshund Heroine Fritzie Saves Her Mom's Life

This'll start your week off with a bang.  Meet 3-year-old pretty red smooth 'Fritzie,' and her mom Clara Lynch, who hail from Dobbin, Texas.  Mrs. Lynch was making her way into the kitchen for a drink in the wee hours of Father's Day 2010 when she collapsed on the floor from a brain aneurysm.  She probably wouldn't be here today to talk about it, had it not been for her little heroine.  Excerpt from Your Conroe:

“I had never had a seizure or any type of health problem like this before,” said Clara. “I don’t remember a thing, but doctors said if I had lain on the floor all night, I probably wouldn’t have survived.”

Moments later, her husband Sam was awakened by Fritzie’s incessant barking.

“This wasn’t the type of barking she would do at a cat or a noise outside,” he said. “She climbed onto the bed and got right in my face – she wouldn’t stop until I got up.”
When Sam did get up, Fritzie led him directly to the kitchen where he discovered Clara and called for an ambulance. The trip from their remote area of Dobbin was slowed by a stalled train blocking a crossing, but Clara was eventually transported to the hospital for treatment.

Way to go Fritzie!  Read all about this little gal and the perceptiveness of animals at Your Conroe.

Dachshund Mix Tries To Rescue Kitties

Your dose of Friday Cute - it's a short little story, taken in its entirety from  South Mississippi's Sun Herald:

It wasn’t unusual to see J.J. come through his doggy door. After all, it was there just for the beagle/dachshund’s use.
But Crystal Crawford of St. Martin was surprised to see what was in her dog’s mouth Thursday.
“He was carrying a kitten in, very gently,” she said. After carefully placing the kitten on the floor, J.J. went back outside and returned with another.
Eventually, the dog brought in six tiny kittens, to his owner’s bemusement. Crawford and her son began looking for the kittens’ mother, but a search along the road revealed nothing.
Meanwhile, J.J. began displaying some very nurturing tendencies.
“He would lie next to them and lick them, like their mother would have,” she said.
J.J.’s concern was strong, but not enough to save the kittens.
The veterinarian who checked out the kittens told Crawford they had been alone in the woods for too long, and there were other complications. They died over the weekend.
J.J. is still a hero in the Crawford household.
“He did his best for them,” his owner said. “He’s my hero dog.”

Awwwwww.....J.J. is such a great little guy!

Dachshund News Roundup!

The countdown is on!  With four days to go til Spring, we couldn't be more excited to reacquaint ourselves with all the wonderful sights and smells the warmer weather brings.  This is a Dachshund News Roundup on a relatively cool March 16, 2011.  Sixty-degree weather is right around the corner!   Above, dog owners take advantage of the nice weather at the dog park at George Ward Park in Birmingham, Alabama, Saturday, March 12, 2011. The city of Fultondale has a new dog park making it the third municipal dog park in the area. A Dachshund runs with a ball as a Doberman closes in.  Source.

This Dachshund was so important to someone that he received a bust! (Rosa Bonheur Memorial Park, Elkridge, Maryland).  Via The Symbolic Beauty of Elkridge Cemeteries, the Elkridge Patch.

On Tuesday, March 15 at 7:30 AM, eight local heroes and one organization were honored at the American Red Cross' signature event – the Fred Meyer Breakfast of Champions in Portland, Oregon.  While 'Missy' the Dachshund had no formal training, her barking definitely made the difference when her owner collapsed.  This is her story via the Oregon Red Cross:  An 11-year-old dachshund, Missy is a tiny dog with enormous persistence. Last September, she showed up at Charles Mitchell’s house, barking furiously and refusing to leave until he followed her across the street to where Missy’s owner, Charlie Burdon, a heart attack survivor, had collapsed in his bedroom after suffering dizziness and nausea. Burdon had managed to reach his wife at work, who called 911, but by the time she and the paramedics arrived, Missy and Mitchell were at his side. Burdon, who was later diagnosed with vertigo, rewards Missy with her usual treats, walks, car rides and trips to Home Depot. The two men, who have known each other for years, both agree that sometimes the biggest hearts come in the smallest packages.

And finally, when the Schoch family’s 5-year-old dachshund, 'Happy,' goes for a run, the little dog actually goes two wheeling.  Recovering from back surgery, the Baytown, Texas, black and tan has her own custom wheelchair to help her get around and boy, does she get around.  Here, Sarah Schoch and son Christian, 9, go on a walk with Happy.  Source. 

Remember, if your Dachshund shows signs and symptoms of back issues, or goes completely down where they can't walk, there are options out there!  Take your dog to your vet immediately, and listen to the good advice offered at Dodgerslist, your Dachshund disc disease/IVDD resource.  There's always a link to them in the links column on your right. They have a very active discussion list, and are real pros when it comes to offering advice for IVDD Dachshunds and general Dachshund health.

Veterinarian Heroes: Dachshund's Surgery Goes On Despite Massive Earthquake

'Jonah' is a lucky dog

Meet Dr. Kirsten Wylie, nurse Amber Walker, and 'Jonah,' the handsome black and tan smooth.  Jonah was undergoing surgery for tumor removal on February 22nd in Christchurch, New Zealand, when the massive 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck.  But our dedicated professionals, our heroes, did not leave Jonah's side.  Excerpt from stuff.co.nz:

Kirsten Wylie was in the middle of a delicate operation to remove a cancerous tumour from a small dog when the earthquake struck. 

Wylie refused to leave Jonah, an eight-year-old dachshund, in the Linwood surgery, completing the 45-minute procedure to remove a thyroid carcinoma by the light of a torch, along with nurse Amber Walker.

Nor did she flinch when she had to blow air into a tube to keep the dog breathing until an oxygen bottle could be connected manually.

Wylie said the "fiddly" operation had been made more difficult by the big jolt, but she never thought of leaving Jonah.

"From where I was standing, I could look out the window and see the fence falling down," she said.

However, the dog "was blissfully unaware of the earthquake".

Wylie was yesterday reunited with a recovering Jonah.

Dachshund Heroism: Wiener Dog Saves Family From House Fire

Our Dachshunds, Our Heroes:  Pretty black and tan longhair 'Fancy' is the latest Dachshund to join our elite list of Dachshund Heroes.  The Kanawha County, West Virginia girl began barking as flames swept through the attic of her sleeping family's home: 

"She just kept barking and I got up and come in there and she was looking up at the attic where we have the ladder and kept barking," said Virginia Falls, Fancy's owner. "I walked up the ladder and when I pushed the thing up to look, the whole attic was engulfed in flames."
The father, mother and two children got out safely, but the parents suffered minor burns and smoke inhalation.
Emergency crews had a tough time getting to the scene because of icy roads. The house was a total loss.

Way to go Fancy!  Via KABC-TV.

Those Special Dachshunds: A Heroine Named Pepper

Thanks so much to Judith Paton for writing in all the way from South Africa with the heroic tale of her beloved girl 'Pepper.'  She writes:

Hi there Joey and Maggie,

First of all I need to start by saying that I just love your site. I will come back to see on a regular basis.

I would like to tell you about my dachshund Pepper, well we have 3 (Pepper, Rogueford & Cricket). But Pepper the eldest at 6 years is a remarkable little dog. Me being a diabetic who uses insulin 4 times daily need never to forget to take it. She just never forgets. On the hour 4 times daily she reminds me about the insulin. She would bark at me if it is time for me to take my shot. When I take my little bag out and open it she barks at me and insists to take the medicine out herself. She would carefully take it out and put it in front of me. But the most remarkable thing she ever did was the day I went into a semi coma. I still cry when I just think of it. I wasn’t feeling well that day and she was following me like a shadow. She always follows me but this was different. She just did not leave me alone. Always licking me and that is not like her. She is not a licker. Long story short, I went and laid on the bed and fell into a semi coma. She realised it and went barking at the gate. My neighbour said it was strange for her that Pepper is barking like that but thought she was just barking at something. When this did not work she pushed the phone off the hook and pushed the buttons. Well she must have pushed the speed dial because it rang through to my sisters phone. When she picked up she heard Pepper barking frantically. She said she just realised it was one of my dogs barking like that. First she thought nothing of it, but after a few minutes she realised but how is it possible for the dog to phone her. Well she rushed off to my house and found me on the bed in this semi coma. (She does have a key to my house). She said that the dogs were beside themselves. Especially Pepper. She was barking and howling and crying at the same time.

This little dog saved my life that day. We always just think she is clever but she a brilliant. Who said dogs can't think for themselves? I owe my life to her.


Unrelated image circa 1940 by Walter Edward Blythe.

Giving Thanks To An Unlikely Hero

Meet Loretta Birchett and her heroine:  pretty red smooth 'Toots.'  The Baltimore, Maryland duo are seen here enjoying a Thanksgiving dinner organized by the city of Baltimore and the American Red Cross after a tornado destroyed their home on November 17th.  Ms. Birchett has nothing but gratitude for her brave little girl:

Loretta Birchett said she was most thankful for her Dachshund, Toots, whom she credits with pulling her to safety from the storm.

Birchett said the dog's ears stood straight up in the air and she started pulling Birchett by the shirt to nudge her off the bed in the Mount Pleasant Heights apartment. The dog then jumped off the bed. As Birchett went to get her, the ceiling started "peeling back like a can."

"We got everybody out and everybody's OK. That's the most important thing," Birchett said.

She usually has Thanksgiving dinner with her two brothers. This year, they dined together at the high school. Her brother, Ronnie Askew, said the dog repaid a favor in saving Birchett.

"Somebody gave her the dog. She saved the dog's life and the dog returned the gift," Askew said.

Way to go Toots!  Read more about the dinner for tornado victims at The Baltimore Sun.

Lacy, The Dachshund Who Saved His Life

There's no denying that our dogs are there for us during the good times as well as the bad times.  And when things get really bad, the unconditional love of a furry friend has absolutely no boundaries - they can even save your life.  Such is the story of Robert Peay and his Dachshund 'Lacy,' seen here, who hail from Springville, Utah. 
Peay struggled with depression after losing his wife to disease, a son to alcohol poisoning and a second son to suicide. Contemplating suicide himself, he prepared to get drunk and do it.

What saved him was a spunky toy dachshund, Lacy, whom he and his wife had adopted three years earlier. He knew that no one else would take care of Lacy, and he knew that she’d miss him.
“She’s the one that did it all,” he said. “We’ve been through a lot, me and her.”

Read the rest of this story at The Daily Herald.

We'll file this one under Dachshund Heroes.

Dachshund Fends Off Coyote

 

We hear so many sad stories of Dachshunds meeting their end when they have a tussle with a coyote - now here's a tale where the Dachshund show's what's what.  Meet our newest hero, sweet smooth "Little Puddin,'" a chocolate and tan who hails from Bayside, Wisconsin, population 4,518. 

Mixing Things Up A Bit

So we take a week off for a little vacation, and oddly the Dachshund news is a little sparse while we're gone - maybe everyone was busy celebrating Mother's Day with their Dachshund Moms?   Regardless, we're always happy to share some news stories with our Dachshund mix cousins, like this handsome little guy, a Dachshund-Jack Russel mix named 'Paco' who made headlines this week after Delta airlines lost him in Mexico City.  His humans had just found him as a stray in Puerto Vallarta, vetted him, and was in the process of transporting him back with them to their home in Canada.  Delta initially offered the couple a $200 refund in fees paid for Paco -- as a credit toward a future flight on Delta.  Nice.  "I think that this is completely absurd, as there is no chance of me flying with Delta Air Lines again," his human said.  Delta has offered additional compensations and apologies after the story broke on Consumerist.com.  Source.

How safe is your pet while flying?  Don't miss the troubling Airline Animal Incident Reports at Third Ammendment.com.

Meanwhile, in the Hero department, meet 'Riki,' a three-year-old Dachshund-Pomeranian mix who hails from Olympia, Washington.  He and his human came home on Tuesday to find a burglar breaking one of the windows, when little Riki went into action, chasing the burglar out of the house and down the street!  Way to go Riki!   The city's K9 unit was dispatched and led police to the perp.  Mitzi Lisle, Riki's human, was able to recover her belongings.  “Everyone on the block is calling him killer,” Lisle said Wednesday.

Read more at the News Tribune.



And finally, thank Dog it's Friday, and if you're like us, you're jumping for joy.  So is 'Burt,' seen here, a Dachshund-Rottweiler mix who, according to his human, holds the Long-Jump World Title for his weight class. At 6 seconds into the video clip you can see his world-renown 15-Footer!   Might as well jump, as they say.  Have a great Friday.

Dachshund Hero Alerts Family To Fire Danger!

Meet our newest hero, 3-year-old red smooth 'JoJo,' his human, Eleven-year old Kalen Huntley, and the rest of the Huntley family who hail from Kennewick, Washington.  An electrical fire was smoldering behind an outlet in Kalen's bedroom, and JoJo did everything he could to alert the family - even trying to shove Kalen out of her bed!  Excerpt from The Tri-City Herald:

The couple and three of the kids were home when the outlet in Kalen's room apparently started overheating around 1 a.m. Sunday.

Kalen was asleep in her room with JoJo, who usually sleeps with Kalen until her parents go to bed, Diane Urquhart said.

That night, however, JoJo kept coming out of Kalen's room to bug the adults, but they couldn't figure out what he wanted. He had been fed and had already gone outside, Urquhart said.

"He came out to see us four times, then kept going back into our daughter's room," she said.

Urquhart said JoJo's ears usually tell his story -- if he's happy, hungry or done something wrong. But this time was different.

"These ears we did not recognize," she said. "And his face, if a dog can look worried, he looked worried."

Urquhart heard Kalen stirring and decided to see what was going on, and when she walked in her room she could smell an extremely strong burning rubber smell and saw JoJo on Kalen's bed.

"He had his heinie against the wall and was shoving his nose against her side trying to wake her up and shove her out of the bed," Urquhart said.

Firefighters told the family the outlet, which had a lamp and alarm clock plugged into it, was minutes away from catching fire, Urquhart said.

The Urquharts saved JoJo when he was a puppy and was found drifting in the water at Two Rivers Park, and now "he saved us," Urquhart said.

Read all about the special boy JoJo at The Tri-City Herald.

Dachshund Hero Saves Neighbor From Burning Home

It was one in the morning on January 10th when the red smooth hero named 'Peanut' started pacing at the back door of his Columbia, South Carolina home.  His human certainly didn't know that the neighbor's house was on fire, and neither did Sandra Harrell, the sleeping neighbor, as an electrical shortage had disabled her smoke alarms.  Excerpt from WLTX:

"He's a little chubby, about a 12-pound dachshund," human Cynthia Lockridge laughed. She let Peanut into the backyard, and he drew her attention to Harrell's house. "I saw the back of her house totally engulfed in flames," Lockridge said.
The neighbor stopped a passing car, asking for help from the passerby. The two banged on the window until Harrell woke up. She had to tear the screen and open the window in order to escape the flames and smoke.
She is thankful to have her life, and thankful to the dog she calls "her angel." Still, Harrell has lost her home and everything inside.

We're so proud of you Peanut!  And we're hoping that Miss Harrell can get her life back in order real soon after this tragedy. Read more at WLTX.