NEW GLOUCESTER — Catherine Frost crunched over the snow-covered pasture and slowly reached behind her for the camera stowed in her backpack. Dozens of North Star Sheep Farm sheep and their guard donkey eyed her warily. “Hi, babies,” she called softly. They backed up. “Hi, sweet babies.” The donkey nudged the herd farther away. Frost […]
Animal Tales
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: When arf meets art
LEWISTON — Tammie Grieshaber was playing around with Photoshop one day when she decided to see how her standard poodle would look wearing a princess crown. The answer, it turned out: pretty darned good. For years, a giant canvas print of that artistic experiment hung in the front hallway of Grieshaber’s Lewiston home, where friends […]
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Posted inFranklin, Lewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Shoes for Sasha
When Sasha took her first steps in her new shoes at the Farmington farmers market a few weeks ago, Dottora Quick was moved to tears. Quick’s 8-year-old German shepherd had been turning under the toes of her back left paw for a while, the lingering result of a spinal embolism. It took nothing for Sasha […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: The cat that stayed down on the farm
AUBURN — Elmer Whiting was used to stray cats showing up at his door, abandoned by owners who dropped them off at his farm and never looked back. They were all perfectly nice cats, and Whiting is something of a cat person, but he never got attached to the strays that came and went. Then […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Home is where the pets are
GREENE — Last year, Albert Abbott had to find a new place to live. Somewhere with a few more people around, a bit more help with daily living. That’s what he needed. What he wanted was Mio. The big black cat had been with him for five years and Abbott, 69, didn’t want to move […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Lucky donkeys find a home in Maine
TOPSHAM — Heather Archer couldn’t ignore the Facebook plea. Or the photo that went with it. A sick, elderly donkey was in a Texas kill pen, destined to become food in Mexico if someone else didn’t buy her first. She needed a new home and she needed it fast. Archer grew up loving horses but […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Auburn bow ties are the cat’s meow
Or, at least, humans. Two years later, about half of her growing customer base has four paws and fur — or feathers. “Almost every other order is for pet (bow ties) . . . most of my followers and repeat customers are the pet ones,” Decato said. “I actually have one picture of a guy […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Meet Freeway, Maine’s only reindeer
GARDINER — On the front lawn of the Helen Thompson School, Gavin Clark watched Freeway the reindeer saunter across her portable pen to nose serenely through a bucket of hay. Gavin, 7, had never seen a reindeer before and didn’t think he’d ever get to see one. He was in awe. But there was just […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: When walking the dog means walking the cat
AUBURN — At least twice a day, Kristine Wilson strolls through her Auburn neighborhood, her dog, Skylar, straining at her leash to sniff newly empty trashcans or peek over a neighbor’s rock wall. And Buddy Kat trots along beside them. “This neighborhood is so great — everybody’s got dogs,” Wilson said. “Well, not everybody, but […]
Posted inLewiston-Auburn
Animal Tales: Building homes for feral felines
NEW GLOUCESTER — Angela Cheetham builds houses. For cats. They’re not grand — a plastic tote within a plastic tote, filled with straw and insulated with scrap pieces of foam board, a cutout for a door — but for feral cats around Maine, they’re as good as mansions. “It gives them a chance to have […]