Beautiful Photos: The Kennel Club Dog Photographer of the Year Competition 2013

The Telegraph - The winning images will be on display throughout London’s leading dog event, Discover Dogs which takes place at Earls Court on 9th and 10th November. For more information see www.discoverdogs.org.uk 
 
The Kennel Club Dog Photographer of the Year Competition consists of six categories: Portrait, Man’s Best Friend, Dogs At Play, Dogs At Work, Puppy and I Love Dogs Because – a category specifically for those aged 16 and under.

Roger Sjolstad from Norway has been selected as the overall winner of the competition with his dynamic image of a young girl and a Great Dane running through water, which was the winner of the ‘Man’s Best Friend’ category. Speaking about winning the biggest canine photography competition in the world, Roger said: “The photograph is of our ten year old daughter, Tea with our dog Robbie and was taken at a lake near our home outside of Oslo. “This photo was absolutely not planned, my wife asked me to bring my camera to take a few shots of the dog swimming. My young Dane had never been near water before this evening, so I was quite surprised when he took off into the water and he just ran, ran, ran! He really enjoyed the water. Tea joined him and together they started running towards the shore and there I was with my camera – at the right place at the right time. “I have always found photography very interesting, I had a darkroom in our basement by the age of twelve but it really took off a few years ago when we inherited three Great Danes and I now combine my biggest interests: dogs and photography.”

Picture: Roger Sjolstad

 

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Hot Wheels - English Bulldog Goes For a Drive

10 Must-Have Apps for Dog Owners

1.  Tagg

Tagg is essentially a GPS attachment for your dog's collar, and because of its many features, it can give you peace of mind. The app will track your dog's activity and send you a message if he goes beyond the boundaries you set. Not only that, Tagg allows you to make sure your dog is getting enough exercise by measuring movement.
Available on iOS and Android.

Screenshot courtesy of Tagg

2. Doggy Datez

Doggy Datez is a mobile social platform for dog owners and their dogs to make friends. The main idea is that you can "mark your territory" and see who else visits your spot. You're also able to search for other Doggy Datez users by gender, age, dog gender, dog age and/or dog breed.
Available on iOS and Android.

Screenshot courtesy of Doggy Datez
 

See the Rest!

Nat Geo Photo Gallery: Domestic Dogs

 

Clementine and Oliver

Photograph by Devan Sreedhar

Clementine and Oliver rest on a picnic table after playing in the dog park.

 

Sasha

Photograph by David Braun

Sasha tries to get every last lick out of an empty ice cream container.

 

Louis Armstrong, Hound Mix

Photograph by Blake DePastino

Louis Armstrong is a Hurricane Katrina rescue dog and was adopted when he was five months old.

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Malachy, The Pekingese Who Won Best in Show

Discovery News - Feb. 15, 2012 – Last night’s winner at the Westminster Kennel Club show is Malachy, a four-year-old Pekingese. It marked his 115th overall Best in Show title.
The fluffy pompom of a dog named Malachy wobbled his way into the best spot beating out a Dalmatian, German Shepherd, Doberman Pinscher, an Irish Setter, a Kerry Blue Terrier and a wire-haired dachshund.
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The rectangular fluff of silver and black fur became the first Pekingese since 1960 to win Best in Show at the Westminster Kennel Club dog show.

The handler of the 11-pound grey cloud of a dog is also his part-owner, David Fitzpatrick.
“Pekes,” as they are sometimes called, are of Chinese origin, dating back to the 8th century. The breed originated in China in antiquity, in the city of Peking. The breed was favored by the Chinese Imperial Court.

The dogs are also commonly called the “Lion Dog,” or “Pelchie Dog” due to their resemblance to Chinese guardian lions.                 More

Dogs Really Do Understand Us Best – Our canine friends get us in ways that no other animals do

Dogs may be born with this inherent gift, since 6-week-old puppies with no major training possess it. - Corbis

THE GIST

• Dogs, but not chimpanzees, can understand human pointing gestures.

• Domestication and years of living with humans have likely given dogs an evolved ability to pay attention to, and understand, human visual communication.

• Some domesticated cats can also understand human pointing.

Discovery News - Chimpanzees may be our closest living relatives, but they do not understand us as well as dogs do.

The study in the latest issue of PLoS ONE. found that chimpanzees could care less when people pointed to objects, but dogs paid attention and knew precisely what the person wanted.

NEWS: Can Dogs Read Minds? Not Exactly

“We think that we are looking at a special adaptation in dogs to be sensitive to human forms of communication,” co-author Juliane Kaminski, a cognitive psychologist at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, told Discovery News. “There is multiple evidence suggesting that selection pressures during domestication have changed dogs such that they are perfectly adapted to their new niche, the human environment.”

Dogs may even be born with this inherent gift, since 6-week-old puppies with no major training possess it.

For the study, Kaminski and her colleagues compared how well chimpanzees and dogs understood human pointing. The person pointed at a visible object out of reach of the human but within reach of the animal subject. If the chimp or dog retrieved the object, he or she would be rewarded with a tasty food treat. (Chimps received fruit juice or peanuts, while dogs got dry dog food.)

The chimps bombed, ignoring the human gestures, even though they were interested and motivated to get the food rewards. The dogs aced the test.         More

Buddy, A Surfing Dog, Breaks Waves and Records

Discovery News - It’s hard to tell from the pictures and videos whether the dogs that competed in this weekend’s surfing championship were psyched, anxious or just curious about the weird things their owners make them do. And some of the wipeouts look intense.

But winner Buddy, a 14-year old Jack Russell Terrier, certainly seemed cool and calm on Sunday as he surfed wave after wave. It was his fifth title at the sixth annual Helen Woodward Surf Dog Surf-a-Thon in Del Mar, Calif. With his win, Buddy earned another distinction: He became the first inductee of the Surf Dog Hall of Fame.

PHOTOS: Record-Breaking Dogs

Eighty canines entered this year’s competition, which raised more than $100,000 for orphaned pets. Dogs competed in one of four weight classes.                  More

Dogs Can Reliably Sniff Out Lung Cancer, German Study Shows

Making A Diagnosis This sniffer dog is going through 

training. European Lung Foundation

Popsci - A dog can accurately detect the early presence of lung cancer by sniffing patients’ breath, doctors in Germany say. While researchers have known for some time that dogs can sniff out the telltale signs of other forms of cancer, this is the first study that proves dogs can reliably smell this particular kind.

This is a breakthrough for lung cancer researchers who have been trying to figure out if there are specific volatile organic compounds associated with the presence of the disease. The dog study suggests that there are.

Researchers at Schillerhoehe Hospital in Germany worked with specially trained dogs who were asked to smell the breath of 220 volunteers. The group included healthy patients, as well as people with lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. The dogs correctly identified 71 positive lung cancer samples out of a possible 100, the researchers write in the European Respiratory Journal. They also correctly identified 372 non-cancerous samples out of a possible 400.          More