It may not look like it, but Chris Rickard, a farmer in Australia, said the fight he put up to save his dog from an angry kangaroo that was trying to drown it, ended in a draw.

Rickard, 49, said he was walking his blue heeler Rocky on Sunday morning when they surprised a sleeping kangaroo in Arthur’s Creek, northeast of Melbourne. The dog chased the animal into a pond, where the kangaroo then turned and pinned the pet underwater. Rickard dove in and tried to pull his dog free, but the kangaroo turned on him, too.

Rickard said he managed to end the attack , and save his dog, when he elbowed the kangaroo in the throat as it tried to hold him under water, The Herald Sun reported.

“I thought I might take a hit or two dragging the dog out from under his grip, but I didn’t expect him to actually attack me,” Rickard said. “I was stuck having to hold onto the dog with both hands because it was half drowned and I couldn’t really see anything because the kangaroo just ripped into me.”

You can see a video of Rickard, recounting the incident from his hospital bed, here.

(Photo via Herald Sun)

Gabriella, the English mastiff scheduled to be executed for biting the wife of Red Sox pitcher Tim Wakefield and another woman, has won a reprieve.

A decision issued Friday by Hingham District Court would allow the dog to be sent instead to a New York shelter, where she would serve life, without parole, the Boston Globe reported.

Gabriella was ordered euthanized by Hingham selectmen after a lengthy hearing in late October because of two biting incidents, both of which took place at her owners’ art gallery in Hingham Square.

The first, in June 2008, was when Gabriella punctured and scratched the thigh area of Hingham resident Stacey Wakefield, wife of the Red Sox pitcher. Gabriella’s owners, Megan and Robert Ullman, were criminally charged after the incident, but the charges were later reduced to a civil complaint. They were ordered not to bring the dog to their shop.

A year later, Braintree resident Krista Brewer was bitten in the abdomen — also at the gallery.

After selectmen voted to have the dog put down, the board received so many calls that it issued a statement late last month explaining the reasons for its decision.

The town’s animal control officer, Leslie Badger, after the death sentence was reached, worked to find a shelter in which Gabriella could live out her life instead. The town was against moving the dog to a kennel in nearby Rockland.

At Friday’s hearing, though, Badger said she’d located a shelter in New York — not named — where the 8-year-old mastiff would be accepted. “She would be a lifer and live out the rest of her life there,” Badger said.

Hingham District Court Clerk Magistrate Andrew Quigley, while affirming the town’s decision to euthanize the dog, added a condition that allows Gabriella to be moved to the shelter in New York.

Gabriella’s owners, who had hoped Gabriella could stay alive closer to home, have 10 days to appeal the decision.

Warner Bros. is buying the story of Nubs, the stray Iraqi mutt who befriended a group of Marines and was shipped home to the U.S. by one of them.

Nubs — so named because most of both his years were lopped off by Iraqi soldiers — befriended Marine Major Brian Dennis and his fellow soldiers while Dennis was on patrol in the Anbar province. When Dennis was required to report to another location, 70 miles away, he bid Nubs farewell, but two days later, Nubs showed up at his new camp.

The story became a media phenomenon in the fall, with Dennis and Nubs appearing on  “Today,” “The Tonight Show With Conan O’Brien” and “The Ellen DeGeneres Show.”

In addition to Dennis’ life rights, filmmakers have acquired the top-selling children’s book “Nubs: A Marine, a Mutt and a Miracle,” which Dennis wrote with Mary Nethery and Kirby Larson. The Little, Brown Books for Young Readers title was published two weeks ago and sits at No. 4 on the New York Times children’s best-seller list.

Justin Zackham (”The Bucket List”) will write and produce the film, according to a Reuters report.

(You can learn more about Nubs, and other dog books, on our book page, Good Dog Reads.)

Shyla, a Chihuahua mix in New Zealand, has undertaken the nursing of seven kittens born to a stray.

The kittens were taken in by a Pets n Vets clinic to save them from being euthanized, and Shyla, who has nursed a previous litter of kittens, was called to duty.

Despite earlier reports that she was expected to survive, the dog thrown off a bridge in Lithuania has died, according to the Lithuanian website that has been credited with helping to track down the man who was videotaped doing the deed.

The man seen in the video, believed to be Svajunas Beniukas, 22, was filmed by friends as he joked about proving “dogs can fly,” then throwing the dog – named Pipiras, which means Pepper — off the side of the bridge.

Miraculously, the dog, whose whimpers can be heard on the video, survived, until this weekend.

I haven’t found an English version of the story yet, but ohmidog! readers inform me that this article on the website 15min.lt reports her death. A rough translation of the article into English can be found www.15min.lt%2Fnaujiena%2Faktualu%2Flietuva%2F56%2F72323%2F" target="_blank">here.

The dog, who reportedly belonged to a neighbor of the suspect, received treatment for multiple fractures and internal injuries. According to reports, Beniuk was upset with the dog for attacking his mother’s chickens.

The dog was dropped from a bridge in the Vilkija district in Kaunas, the second largest city in Lithuania.

After the video appeared on Lithuanian websites, and then around the world, dog lovers helped identify the man as Beniukas. Upon learning of the hunt online, he turned himself in to police.

The dog had allegedly killed some of his mother’s chickens at her home in the village of Seredzius.

Beniukas, who lives in Kaunas, has been charged with animal cruelty. If convicted, he faces up to a year in jail.