Dr Doolittle

We've often seen how ingenious humans can be when it comes to helping animals out with clothing. Here's another story we can fill away in under the same category - a penguin being given wet suit.

Clearly this isn't to help him swim. No, bizarrely, the poor chaps feathers all fell out and this put him at risk of sunburn. So the staff at Penguin World (where else?) put together a wetsuit for him from the legs of a man size wetsuit.

Now he can swim about to his hearts content, keeping safe from the sun, and nice and warm too. Warms the cockles of your heart doesn't it?

UnBAAleviable

Sheep are shrinking?! What the Dickens. IS there no END to this madness in the world right now?!

With sheep shrinking wool shortages will become common, knitting will become a dark art, practicsed underground by knitting junkies looking for their next hit of wool to weave;, needle abuse will have a whole new meaning; nice thick jumpers to keep out the cold will become mythical, like a golden fleece, and we'll all be freezing.

Or maybe we won't, who knows.

Outfoxed

City foxes are becoming more and more populous and so their interactions with humans are bound to increase. In Germany, one such city fox has become a notorious shoe thief, 86 pairs of shoes beings found in the fox's den, and more nearby.

Why would a fox want shoes? Are its own feet not suited enough for city living so it decided some human footwear was necessary? If so, that's a fairly clever piece of work by Fantastic Mr Fox. In fact, perhaps there are tunnels all over the place that old Foxy Loxy's set up to reach the bakers, the butchers and so on to save on the effort of catching his food.

Horsing around

We could probably do a 'cute animal' story every day, perhaps we should limit ourselves to one a week; but we've had no calls to stop, so probably won't.

Anyways, today's is an especially good one as it involves numerous creatures wearing traditional German dress (shrug), mostly notably a horse, but also dogs too.

Where these people suddenly get their brainwaves from is beyond us. It's enough of a challenge to look stylish and sophisticated everyday, let alone worrying about animals - and they have their own clothes anyway. Bizarre.

Alpaca Mac

A cute animal story to ease us all back into the working week after the joys of bank holiday Monday. A baby alpaca has been given a little high-vis coat help keep it warm in the inclement spring weather. Bless.

Aporkalypse

The swine flu thing is very odd. A bit scary too. As you've no doubt seen on the news, many people have taken to wearing masks to try and stop any particles of pig enter their beings, and, being the creative bunch of people humans are, many are decorating their masks with hilarious pictures - as you can see here.

Uping the Ante

When we started this blog there was never a time we considered we might get to write about the following - an anteater whose owner makes clothes for her beloved pet.

Words can't really do justice to this story. So just enjoy the picture.

Cute animal story

A cat has been caught stealing clothes, which makes him a cat burglar. Too obvious.

Apparently the cat, called Skittles (aw, that's a nice name), likes to target people's washing lines for his thieving, probably finding the allure of garments blowing suggestively in the wind too much for his little cat brain to ignore.

Animals and clothing are a regular topic on this here blog, probably because whenever animals and clothing (the preserve of humans) come together it is invariably very cute. Do you have any nice stories about animals and clothing? If so, post below!

There's a pigeon in my pants!

Man caught with pigeon down his trousers. There's a sentence you don't type or read very often. But it's true and it shows the lengths people will go to when they try to BREAK THE LAW! Don't break the law, it's not a good thing to do. In fact it's illegal.

The hapless man in the story was found with many items upon his person: pigeons, eggs, seeds and an aubergine. Bizarre. He potentially faces up to 10 years in prison, underlining the seriousness of attempting to smuggle wildlife to a country. You can seriously upset the balance of an ecosystem by doing so - like in that episode of The Simpsons when Bart brings a frog in and they ravage the crops - it's fictional and a cartoon but it makes a serious point.

Anyway, we've gone off remit here. Trousers with pigeons in, haha, *shakes head*, news eh?! Crazy.

Dogs in clothes - cute or cruel?

The animal kingdom now. Dogs in clothing is not a rare sight - in fact we've covered it before with Hattie the High-Vis dog - but the RSPCA has reminded people that dressing dogs in clothing could constitute cruelty. There is a huge market of clothing for dogs out there and many people love their pets to a degree where they do indeed take advantage of these clothes to dote on their pet - but is it cruel?

Lynn Williams, founder of dog charity Happy Dogs is quoted in the story and said: 'People love their pets and the retail trade has latched on to that. To see a little dog dressed up in boots, I think, is a little over the top. I have an extreme love of the dog, but I don't like to see them dressed up as little human beings. I don't think they like it either. It's unnatural.'

This seems a farily considered outline of the debate but what do you think? Should we dress animals in clothing - is it just a bit of fun or should it be condoned?

Cat burglar

Two day of the great no-clothes-related-stories drought continues - but never fear! - we have an enjoyable story that transcends the need for it to be directly relevant to the remit of this blog, because the cat involved is just so darn cute. See.

World leaders in...ponchos?

Those of you au fait with the surreal fantasy comedy The Mighty Boosh will know from Vince Noir that "it's impossible to feel unhappy in a poncho". The world leaders of the Asian Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) have been busy testing this theory as they dressed in Andean ponchos in honour of the location of the event - Lima, Peru.

The ponchos worn could have ranged anywhere between $100 and $6,000 according to reports and are made with materials from Alpacas. Alpaca, along with vicuna and llama, are the three camelids native to Peru. Their warm, dryable fibers were worn by the ancient Incas, who wove their fleece into royal robes on delicate hand looms. Descendents of the Incas still herd the animals and spin their coats into ponchos and ear-flapped caps.

Have you ever worn a poncho? Did it stave off the blues? Perhaps to beat the Credit Crunch woes the government could issue everyone with one? Perhaps not.

Dog is new stationmaster

With the terrible news that John Sergeant is off Strictly, we felt a fun story was in order for today's blog entry. So we were pleased to come across the story of a dog being made stationmaster of a small railway station in Japan. As you can see from the picture there's something strangely commanding about him - you wouldn't risk jumping the barriers with him snapping at your heels. There's even a little video of the fella in action here.

Last week we reported on Hatty the dog being made to wear high-visibility clothing so it seems dogs in workwear - either PPE or corporate wear - is becoming something of a trend. What other jobs could dogs do, and what uniforms would they need to do them?