The Daily Beast Special - Amazing Horse Rescue - February 29, 2012

 

 

 

Newspix / Rex Features

It was a race against the tide that pulled at the heartstrings. For three hours, show horse Astro was stuck neck deep in thick mud at Avalon Beach on Corio Bay, Australia as the tide inched closer.

 

Newspix / Rex Features

Rescue crews first tried to pull the 18-year-old, 500kg horse free with fire hoses, and then a winch before a vet turned up to sedate Astro and pull him clear with a tractor.

 

Newspix / Rex Features

Owner Nicole Graham (above) said she and daughter Paris, 7, set off at noon when without warning she sunk up to her waist in thick mud.

 

Newspix / Rex Features

The crews knew by 5pm that the tide would have come all the way in. But within minutes of the waters rising around him, Astro was being dragged up on to solid ground slowly but surely - the team filthy but ecstatic.

Newspix / Rex Features

After the traumatic ordeal, Nicole Graham leads Astro along beach.

The Daily Beast - Adorable Dingo Puppies - February 29, 2012

AFP PHOTO / STEPHANIE PILICK

Three dingo puppies look out of their kennel on February 28, 2012 at the Tierpark Friedrichsfelde zoo in Berlin. Four baby dingos were born at the zoo on January 3, 2012. 

 

   AFP PHOTO / STEPHANIE PILICK

Three dingo puppies sit in their enclosure on February 28, 2012 at the Tierpark Friedrichsfelde zoo in Berlin. Four baby dingos were born at the zoo on January 3, 2012.

The Daily Beast - February 28, 2012

Ben Torode / Rex Features

If this young monkey's reaction to slipping into a warm bath is anything to go by, these primates really are like humans. The juvenile Japanese snow monkey was photographed enjoying the famous hot springs at Jigokudani monkey park in Nagano.

The Daily Beast - February 27, 2012

AP Photo/Selcan Hacaoglu

A young bear prepares to step down from a rock at a snow covered zoo in Ankara, Turkey, Feb. 19, 2012.

The Daily Beast - February 26, 2012

AP Photo/Petr David Josek

Nora, a Rothschild giraffe, stares at the camera at Prague Zoo in Prague, Czech Republic, Feb. 17, 2012.

The Daily Beast - February 25, 2012

AP Photo/Heinz Ducklau

Eighteen-month old white lions from left: Tandy, Konya and Kolwa, are seen Thursday, September 14, 1995 at the Safari Park in Stukenbrock, near Bielefeld, Germany. They are the first white lions in Europe and were born in the Philadelphia Zoo.

The Daily Beast - Brown Bear Awakes from Hibernation - February 24, 2012

 

AP Photo / LEHTIKUVA / Kaisa Siren

Palle-Jooseppi, a male brown bear, wakes up after winter hibernation at Ranua Zoo in Ranua, Finland, in Lapland on Feb. 23, 2012.

 

AP Photo / LEHTIKUVA / Kaisa Siren

After a short stroll he decided to continue a nap in a soft snow bank.

The Daily Beast - Chikilidae, A New Species of Legless Amphibian - February 23, 2012

AP Photo/ www.frogindia.org, Sathyabhama Das Biju

In this photo released by www.frogindia.org, a chikilidae egg is shown in the soils of northeast India. Since the age of dinosaurs the chikilidae has burrowed unbothered beneath the monsoon-soaked soils of remote northeast India, unknown to science and mistaken by many villagers as a deadly, miniature snake. Their discovery, published Wednesday, Feb. 22, 2012, in a journal of the Royal Society of London, gives yet more evidence that India is a hotbed of amphibian life with habitats worth protecting against the country's industry-heavy development agenda.

 

AFP PHOTO/WWW.FROGINDIA.ORG/Sathyabhama Das Biju/HO

Researchers digging through mud in northeast India have discovered a new family of legless amphibians in a rare scientific breakthrough detailed in a study released on February 22, 2012.

AFP PHOTO/WWW.FROGINDIA.ORG/Sathyabhama Das Biju/HO

The family of burrowing, tailless creatures was identified by scientists working for five years in remote Indian states including Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland.

 

The Daily Beast - February 22, 2012

AP Photo/Charlie Riedel

A dog belonging to Texas Rangers pitcher Tanner Scheppers carries off a baseball during an unofficial workout at spring training baseball Saturday, Feb. 18, 2012, in Surprise, Ariz.

The Daily Beast - February 21, 2012

AFP PHOTO / JULIAN STRATENSCHULTE

A polar bear dives into a pool at the zoo in Hanover, northern Germany, on February 8, 2012.Temperatures plunged to new lows in Europe where last two week-long cold snap has now claimed more than 220 lives and forecasters warned that the big freeze would tighten its grip at the next time.