Goeldi’s monkeys are endangered. They are native to South America and considered to be a relatively “new” monkey. No one knew anything about them until 1904 when a man named Emilio Goeldi discovered them.

Azee and Cinco seem to be very happy living with each other at the Denver Zoo. They arrived here last fall.

Azee is the female. She is 3 years old. Cinco, the male, is just a year old.

They are constantly on the move in their exhibit in the “monkey house”. They also live with some tamanduas, as they would in the rainforests of South America.

Goeldi’s monkeys like to be around one another. In the wild, they live in extended families in the rain forest. They have a very loud call which they use to keep in touch and warn each other if predators are around.

If you go to visit Azee and Cinco at the zoo, you will probably be able hear them call out from the other side of the glass.

The Zoo’s Spring/Summer hours begin on Sunday, April 1st. The zoo will be open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. until the end of September.

From her home, a woman watched a tragic situation unfold before her eyes, but then she saved an animal’s life.

Daniel Dexter Darling Jr., an ex-con, is facing charges of animal cruelty, police said.

Darling’s neighbor, Kelly Ann Vanvoorde, said she saw, Floosie, a 1-year-old Jack Russel Terrier, in a cage on Darling’s balcony on Saturday. Vanvoorde said she saw Darling throw the cage off the balcony and then into a creek behind her residence.

Vanvoorde said he appeared intoxicated at the time and actually fell into the creek with the cage.

Vanvoorde’s boyfriend retrieved the cage and dog from the creek, she said.

“He was shaken and scared and was whining a little bit,” Vanvoorde said after Floosie was retrieved from the water.

“(Darling) came over and asked for the dog back, but we told him he could have it back after we talk to the cops,” Vanvoorde said

Police said Darling is facing one count of felony animal cruelty.

Police said Darling told them he was at a Detroit strip club during the time of the alleged incident.

“We’re going to fight to get the dog into our custody,” Lyle Herman of St. Clair Animal Control said.

Darling is expected in court next month, and could face up to four years in prison if convicted.

You can’t put a dollar value on a pet owner’s love for their cat or dog.

But that’s exactly what the Streetsville, Ontario, pet food company Menu Foods faces in reimbursing local owners of animals who ate contaminated pet food linked to the deaths and illnesses of animals across the country.

Dolores and Robert Weise’s 8-year-old cat Pee Shoo was in Dunnellon Animal Hospital with renal failure for a week - at a cost of more than $1,000 in critical care - after eating Special Kitty wet food from a pouch bought at a local Wal-Mart.

Social Security is the only steady income the retired couple has, but fortunately for Pee Shoo, they had enough money saved up to cover the costs. The cat is home again with a daily IV drip being applied to make sure the feline stays hydrated.

But not every person with a sick animal has the resources to get them better.

“I know there are people who have to take their animals home to die,” said Robert Weise.

The couple shares a tale common with people whose animals have been diagnosed with kidney failure after eating recalled pet food.

Across north central Florida, thousands of dollars have been spent on the testing, critical care and aftercare of pets that have eaten the tainted pet food. Higher-costing prescription food or other medicines are ongoing costs owners like the Weise family face, with little or no guarantees about how long such measures must be taken.

Upon learning about the possible connection between Pee Shoo’s illness and the company’s food, the couple tried 20 to 30 times to reach Menu Foods.

They often got a busy signal. When they got through, their name and number was taken, and they were told someone would call back.

“Nobody would call back,” Robert Weise said. None of their calls were returned to date.

Across the country, several lawsuits have been filed against Menu Foods. The company has been criticized for not acting quickly enough after its own tests showed animal deaths and for not responding fast enough to a rising tide of customer complaints.

The Weises have thought about hiring a lawyer, but they’ve heard about Menu Foods’ recent promise to make good on all the veterinary bills associated with the recall. They’re waiting to see if that actually happens.

“There’s a little nagging doubt in my mind that Menu Foods can handle all the claims,” Robert Weise said.

Knowing about several cases at the Dunnellon Animal Hospital and hearing about more in Ocala, Robert Weise wonders just how widespread the cases must be.

Cases of kidney damage in otherwise healthy cats and dogs, which veterinarians suspect are the result of the contaminated pet food, have been seen in Ocala at Paddock Park Animal Care Center, All Pets Clinic and Airport Road Animal Clinic. At Dunnellon Animal Hospital, two cats had to be euthanized after kidney failure veterinarians believe was the result of eating bad pet food.

Veterinarians say they’re getting a steady stream of pet owners bringing in animals for testing if they’ve eaten recalled pet food. But trying to figure out exactly how many animals may have been sickened by the bad pet food across the country is like throwing a dart at a constantly moving dartboard.

“If this is typical, there will be thousands of claims made,” Robert Weise said.

A press release on Menu Foods’ Web site reports the company has heard from about 200,000 consumers regarding the recall. Not all of those are claims.

Menu Foods is advising people who believe their pet has been made ill by contaminated pet food to save receipts from pet food purchases and copies of their veterinarian bills. The company is telling consumers to keep any pet food pouches or cans with the recall-specific dates and UPC codes on them, but in a place where they can’t be mistakenly fed to pets.

Dolores and Robert have receipts from Wal-Mart showing purchases of Special Kitty cat food, and a pile of vet bills.

“I’d like to think if Menu Foods stiffs us that Wal-Mart would honor the claim,” he said. “If not, we’d take them to small claims court.”

Dolores has been angered by Menu Foods lack of response and depressed that veterinarians can’t give her assurance her cat will fully recover. She’s been stressed by the veterinary bills, knowing more medical bills are on the way with her husband going in for surgery in April.

“It’s getting hairy,” Dolores said about the family finances.

But Dolores won’t skimp on medical care for Pee Shoo, named for the sound she made to scoot the cat off furniture when it was a kitten (as in p-shoe). More than anything, Dolores wants her admittedly spoiled cat back to her old high jinks.

“My animal is my heartbeat,” she said.

Lynn DeKrey got interested in saving golden retrievers when she saw a group’s booth at a dog show, but she never thought she would be doing it three months after signing up.

DeKrey, of Steele, was among volunteers who helped take 83 goldens from the Apple Creek Kennel last weekend.

They were removed from longtime breeder Leonard Moos after a routine inspection by the USDA, which licenses dog breeding operations, found violations including dirty and poorly bedded kennels.

Moos handed over the dogs voluntarily and said he was thankful the USDA came.

Nearly all the goldens went to foster homes in Minnesota, because the rescue group, RAGOM, is based there and it aligned with Animal Ark Shelter of Hastings, Minn., to care for the animals.

Seven of the goldens - two adult females and one of the female’s litter of five puppies - stayed in North Dakota with Lynn and Tim DeKrey, who have a boarding and grooming business at their farm and who love and have the golden retriever breed themselves.

The DeKreys will keep the saved goldens for at least another month, or for however long it takes for them to be adopted into proper homes. The puppies are just 3 weeks old.

The goldens were in pretty good physical condition and had decent body weight, though they all needed some veterinary attention for updated shots and immunizations, DeKrey said.

What’s been more difficult is the grown goldens’ behavior toward humans, especially in a breed that’s known for being tolerant and laid back toward people.

DeKrey said the goldens lack socialization skills because they haven’t had much human contact.

She’s named the adult females. One is Nevaeh, “heaven” spelled backward, the mother of the 3-week-old puppies. She named the other younger female “Miracle.”

It’s Miracle, who’s probably not yet 2 and who just had a litter, who makes her feel the most sad, for the way she’s so shy and frightened of human contact. She sits back in the kennel, afraid to come forward and be touched, DeKrey said.

She said dogs can’t be treated like livestock because they have generations of human contact bred into them.

“They’ve been raised for a long time to be companions to people,” she said. “I’m hoping we can rehabilitate them to be tolerant and accept people.”

Nevaeh is beginning to enjoy being touched and petted and will lick DeKrey’s hand, she said.

DeKrey said she’s most concerned with the health of the puppies. Two of them have heart murmurs and another has some laxity in its hips, which could develop into hip dysphasia.

She said dog breeders should monitor the genetics of the dogs to prevent life-threatening and debilitating characteristics from being carried on. Moos was not available to comment on the genetics of his dogs.

She said it’s too soon to know how the heart murmurs will affect the puppies in the long run. Some dogs can’t live with the condition, while medication controls it in other dogs.

After it happened, Moos said he was relieved to have the dogs removed. He said they were in good shape, but his operation was getting down and out and going “pretty fast downhill. I told the USDA I was glad they came.”

DeKrey said she hopes the dogs she’s fostering will be able to remain in North Dakota, partly to demonstrate that people here care about the animals.

Applications will go through RAGOM, which stands for Retrieve A Golden Of Minnesota. The group takes found and surrendered dogs and finds homes for them. People who want dogs have to apply and be interviewed and their home inspected before they can have one.

My cat died and came back to life.

My parents first adopted her as a stray and named her “Miss Kitty” (over my strong objections). For a while she was a neighborhood cat that we fed. She had a litter of five kittens, which we cared for and found homes for.

Miss Kitty was renamed “Mommy Cat” after she had babies — a bit of a step up, but still a terrible name for a cat. It’s more of a title or description, really…

Anyway, Mommy Cat/Miss Kitty started sleeping on our porch and spending time in the house with her kittens. She had a very sweet disposition and even brought us presents in the form of dead birds.

Then one night, she died — or so we thought.

As my father attempted to bury her one morning, she woke up. That was quite a stroke of luck for her.

Despite rumors to the contrary, most cats don’t have nine lives. And if they did, spending her last eight in a hole in the ground would have been a most unpleasant experience, I’m sure.

The best explanation the vet could offer is that Mommy Cat/Miss Kitty was poisoned by an herbicide in the neighbor’s garden. She is now alive and well, but my family learned a valuable lesson about gardens and pet safety.

Thanks to Mommy Cat/Miss Kitty’s little excursion in the afterlife, we now keep all our pets inside and never use herbicides or pesticides in our gardens. We do use fertilizer on our lawn. This might be a problem if we still had a dog, but he passed away a while ago — we’re pretty sure, anyway.

When we did have our dog, whose name was Josh (in our defense, he had that name when we got him), we always fenced-in all our flower beds. If given half the chance, Josh would dig up the garden, which was full of toxic plants.

My parents recently started using cocoa bean mulch — living as near as they do to Hershey, Pa., the self-proclaimed sweetest place on Earth.

Cocoa contains caffeine and theobromine, both harmful substances for dogs. If we had put cocoa mulch in our yard years ago Josh would have eaten it. He ate most anything, be it animal, vegetable or mineral, and a metal fence around a garden wouldn’t have stood in the way of him and chocolate.

My parents kept the dog well clear of fertilizer, toxic plants and delicious mulch, but they never considered our neighbor’s yard. So a word of warning: If you have an outside pet, keep an eye on it.

After all, who would’ve thought that miracle grow actually produces miracles?

The Senate on Tuesday approved a bill intended to help finance a 7,000-seat equestrian center in Lewis County.

A change adopted by the lawmakers would also allow Federal Way to raise money for a performing arts center, however, sending the bill back to the House for a second approval.

The proposed facility in Lewis County, called the Regional Equestrian Center, has been promoted as one way to help the area recover from the recent closure of the nearby coal mine. Backers have predicted it would create 50 full-time jobs and several times that number in part-ime positions by hosting events like rodeos and possibly monster truck rallies.

The bill, HB 2388, would allow an additional sales and use tax within special districts to finance facilities.

It has now been approved — at least in some version — by both the House and Senate, a better record than other requests for public financing for a stock car racing track or a new Seattle basketball arena.

They were called Wallace and Gromit, a couple of abandoned yellow Labrador retriever siblings who wound up at the Coulee Region Humane Society.

The pups were 5 months old last June when they were adopted out, but to separate homes.

Months later, Pat Kucera at Diggity Dog Daycare noticed two yellow Labs named Levi and Cooper would “play like crazy” every time they got the chance during visits to his facility.

“They love playing chase, ring around the picnic table and face wrestling on the couches,” Kucera said.

When he mentioned their behavior to their respective owners, Cyndy Lamb remembered the other pup she never forgot — the one that was with Cooper when she took him home from the humane society.

She asked Denice Mack, owner of Levi, about her dog’s past and found out she too adopted her dog last June.

“When she said he was 5 months old when she got him, my heart stopped,” Lamb said.

SARATOGA SPRINGS * Two local organizations are going to the dogs.

Fundraisers for HOPE Animal Rescue and AIM Services Inc. will be held on April 21 and 22, respectively.

Walkers don’t have to bring a dog to participate in either event, but well-behaved pooches are welcome at both. All dogs must be leashed and have proof of current vaccination.

- HOPE Animal Rescue’s Walk for the Animals will take place April 21 in Congress Park.

Participants should meet at the fountain, near the Broadway entrance, at noon. The walk will begin at 1 p.m.

Prizes will be awarded for best wagging tail, pet/owner look-alike, most pledges, best costume and more.

Registration is $20, or $20 minimum in pledges. Proceeds go toward helping homeless animals.

Volunteer assignments include setup, registration, raffle ticket sales, sitting at pit stops, setting up animal agility course and cleanup.

Registration begins at 9 a.m. and the walk starts at 10 a.m., rain or shine. There are two routes: 1-1/2 miles and 3/4 mile.

The twin brothers have never served in the military, but they said they felt a patriotic call to duty Friday when they discovered “America’s bird” was in peril.

Joe and Jon Barbara, 51, found a bald eagle in Erie on Good Friday and transferred it to Monroe raptor specialists Dave and Scott Hogan for rehabilitation and safekeeping.

“That’s our national symbol. It’s one of the most powerful symbols in the world, and we just wanted to make sure it was preserved,” Joe Barbara, of Erie, said. “We are not heroes. Any good American would have done the same thing.

“The real heroes are those that put their life on the line every day to make sure that symbol is preserved.”

Jon Barbara, of Point Place, a Canadian National Railway conductor, spotted the bald eagle perched on a tree stump in a wooded area.

He was scanning the woods last Thursday from the window of his Toledo-bound train because about a week earlier his brother Joe, an engineer for Canadian National, had seen the eagle off the railroad tracks — tracks which he and his brother have ridden from Toledo to Detroit for more than 30 years.

By reporting the bird to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, the brothers figured they had done their civic duty. But the brothers and their co-workers continued to keep a lookout, just in case, scanning the woods beyond the tracks whenever they sped past the Substation Road-Suder Avenue area.

After seeing the eagle was still out there, the brothers, who trapped their first muskrat when they were 6 years old, took matters into their own hands.

“It was like the call of the wild,” Jon Barbara said. “I called my brother Joe and told him, ‘Don’t make any plans because we are going to be rescuing a raptor tomorrow.’”

Joe Barbara’s wife, Helenne, 46, grabbed their son’s video camera and the trio went off for a little “search and rescue” last Friday morning.

Their friend, Erie resident Mick Johnson, 58, drove the pickup and covered “the southern escape route,” watching in case the eagle made a dash for the perimeter.

Joe herded the eagle over to his brother Jon, who picked it up by its talons. The eagle, likely famished from a week in the woods and with a broken left wing, did not put up a struggle.

“I thought, ‘If the bird’s in there, I’m going to get it out. I’m not going to let it spend one more night out there.’ It was a feeling of patriotism,” Jon Barbara said.

He said his uncles and father fought in World War II, and that neither he nor his brother had ever served the country, “but it’s like this was something I could do for the national bird.”

“What a great, great, awesome feeling, holding America’s bird in your hands,” he said. “I’ve trapped lots of foxes and coyotes over the years, but this was the pinnacle. … I’ve seen eagles before, but the closest one I ever touched was on the back of a quarter.”

Scott Hogan, 27, picked up the eagle from the Barbaras and he and his father, Dave, took it to a veterinarian and got the forearm of its left wing pinned.

The five-pound eagle with a six-foot wing span is staying at the Hogans’ back porch with its wing in a sling.

The endangered bird is safe for now.

If it fully recovers, Scott Hogan says he and his father will release it back into the wild. Otherwise, they likely will give the 5-year-old bird to a local zoo to be used in bird shows.

A two-year-old puppy has become a household name in a residential neighborhood in North China’s Hebei Province.

Dan Dan is far more than a cuddly pet dog. It is a volunteer watchdog and occasional purse retriever, Yanzhao Metropolis Daily reported.

According to its owner granny Geng, a pensioner in the provincial capital city of Shijiazhuang, the tender yellow-brown furred canine is both an amusing companion, and incredibly intelligent.

During a regular morning exercise on March 19, Geng strolled along the street, as usual, with Dan Dan.

Suddenly, the dog turned around and ran into the nearby woodland.

“I thought Dan Dan may have just run off to have a bit of a frolic and play in the grass,” granny Geng recalled.

Instead the puppy returned to Geng, unexpectedly, with a scarlet-colored wallet in its mouth.

Geng checked the identification card inside the wallet, which revealed it belonged to a local woman named Zhang Yanli, who lives in an adjacent residential community.

Also in the wallet was a bank debit card, a healthcare insurance document, and several other items of great importance.

After an unsuccessful attempt to try and return the wallet directly to the owner, Geng handed the wallet back to the bank where the debit card was registered.

“The owner must come to the bank to report the loss and cancel the card service. Following that the wallet can be collected from the bank,” Geng said, smiling at Dan Dan sitting loyally by her side.

“It’s not this tender whiling facing bad guys though.” Geng said, citing another great deed by Dan Dan — scaring away a bike thief last year.

It was also during an early morning walk that Dan Dan, upon hearing a cry for help, the usually tame puppy dashed towards a thief who was attempting to flee riding on the bike he had just stolen. Startled by Dan Dan, the thief fled, leaving the bike behind.