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Auto show featuring Mustangs and Ford-powered vehicles.

Proceeds benefit St. Francis Service Dog Foundation and The Kathy LaShier Foundation for Pets.

Food, music, games and prizes. Award winners will be announced around 3 p.m.

When: 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., Sat. May 2

Where: Tanglewood Mall near Firestone, 4420 Electric Road, Roanoke

Cost: Free for spectators; vendors may download registration form for details

Contact: John Beels, 598-8375, jb67stang@hotmail.com, www.roanokevalleymustangclub.com

William Watson, RVSPCA executive director, and RVSCPA employees William Green and Nathan Miller assist Ann Richards of Manna Ministries in unloading food donated for the PET program.

Bethel Baptist Church's food pantry has become the third partner in the Roanoke Valley SPCA's Pets Eat Too program.

Bethel's pantry joins Manna Ministries and the Local Office on Aging in distributing donated cat and dog food to elderly and low-income families in our area. The donated food, collected for the RVSPCA by retailers including Ukrops on Franklin Road and Black Dog Salvage on 13th Street in Old Southwest, allows families, especially seniors, to keep their beloved companions.

For the rest of the month of April, Black Dog Salvage will give a 25 percent discount to customers who bring in six cans or an 8-pound or larger bag of food for the PET program.

The Roanoke Valley SPCA is sponsoring a microchip clinic on Saturday, April 25, from 10 a.m. to noon.

The tiny chip is inserted under the pet's skin between the shoulder blades. That sounds worse than it actually is. Even my paper-thin-skinned greyhounds barely flinched when they were chipped. 

At the moment of chip insertion, I believe my kitty, Thai, gave the vet a very dirty look, similar to this one.

But hey, he's a cat. That's just how he rolls.

The chip can ensure that your pet finds the way home if he or she ever becomes lost. As careful as we all try to be with our pets, sometimes they just slip away. If your pet is found, that chip becomes your pet's identification card, allowing any animal control officer anywhere to be able to reunite you with your wayward fur baby.

Prove that you adopted your best buddy from the RVSPCA and the fee for the chip is only $15. For all other critters, the fee is $25. If you adopted your pal from the RVSPCA in the last two years, you have no worries; your critter is already chipped.

Got hay? On this tax day,  consider a deduction for next year's return:

Harmony Farm Sanctuary, a refuge for farm animals in Botetourt County affiliated with Angels of Assisi, will cut, bale and remove hay from your fields free of charge.

And you get to claim the value as a charitable donation since the hay will then be used to feed the animals at the 501C3-designated farm.

If you have fields that need cutting, please call Jason Burgess at 309-3796 or e-mail him at jburgess@angelsofassisi.org.

The long winter is over and it's time to get out into the fresh spring air and, as my dear old mother use to say, blow the stink off. Here's a couple of events that can help you and your dog to shake off the cabin fever.

Pooches on Parade

The Pooch Parade for the Franklin County Humane Society will be held Saturday, May 2, at the Franklin County YMCA Fitness Trail in Rocky Mount.  The walk will benefit the animals kept at the Humane Society shelter.

Walkers can pick up sponsor sheets from the Planned Pethood Clinic or by e-mailing donna@plannedpethoodrockymount.com.

Registration opens at 9 a.m., the walk begins at 10 a.m. and prizes will be awarded at 11 a.m. The first 50 walkers that turn in at least $25 in donations will receive a T-shirt. The event will also feature demonstrations by the canine officers of the Franklin County Sheriff's Department, face-painting and balloon animals for the kids, and real animals from the shelter for adoption at the information table.

For more information, call 489-3491. 

Mutt Strut

Pack up the kids and the family dog for a fundraising walk and carnival on Saturday, May 16 at Wasena Park in downtown Roanoke.

Carilion Clinic, the event's sponsor, is challenging families and work groups to compete for the "Best in Show" title, awarded to the top fund-raising mutt in the strut.

Registration starts at 9 a.m. and forms can be found here. Pre-registration is required and your well-mannered pooch will have to keep you on a leash at all times. Please bring proof that you are a responsible pet parent and your dog is up-to-date on his or her rabies vaccine.

Admission to the carnival is free. There will be a variety of contests, including dog/owner look-a-likes, best-dressed, etc. for a $5 entry fee ($15 for three or more contests.)

The event will include 10-minute seated massages for $5, concessions and a bake sale, pet photography for a $5 sitting fee, face painting for the kids, clowns and free balloons.

There will be a dog parade at noon and a presentation by Carilion's pet therapy volunteer.  A "Blessing of the Paws" will be given by the hospital chaplain.

Proceeds will benefit Carilion Clinic's patient fund, which helps families deal with expenses associated with hospice care, including last-wish requests for patients and funeral costs.

Many thanks to blog reader Sara Baker of Radford for alerting me to a story from Sunday's NRVCurrent about Belle, Dublin's library cat. It seems that the kitty is facing an uncertain future.

Click here to read columnist Christian Trejbal's story about Belle. The Pulaski County Library Board may have to make an unpopular decision and evict her from the Charles & Ona B. Free Memorial Library in Dublin, the kitty's home for the last three years.

Belle does not belong the library; her living depends on its patrons who provide her with food, litter, toys and attention. While most library visitors are entertained by Belle's friendly demeanor, apparently the board recieved complaints in January.

The board is considering whether Belle is a liability for the library, and if her presence would deter patrons who do not care for cats or who are allergic to pet dander.

This is a tough one for me. Needless to say, I would love to visit a library or business that has a resident cat. For someone with mild allergies, simply restricting Belle to the backroom, as the librarians do now, would probably be sufficient to allow that person to peruse the books in peace.

That said, I can also understand that a library, supported by tax dollars and intended for use by all citizens, should not end up being off-limits to people with severe allergies.  You can chose to not patronize a pet-friendly, privately-owned business if it makes you uncomfortable.

But you shouldn't have to choose between books and breathing. Libraries should be accessible to everyone.

The board is scheduled to meet on April 28 at 5 p.m. at the Dublin library. The subject of Belle's living arrangements will likely be on the agenda. If you live in the area, use the library and have an opinion about Belle's presence among the stacks, you may want to make plans to attend.

Sammy, a two-year-old mixed breed shelter rescue dog, is led up the ramp of the dog friendly Honda Element concept car displayed at the 2009 New York International Auto Show on April 9. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

NEW YORK (AP) — A new offering from Honda Motor Co. may get dogs more interested in checking out the inside of their ride rather than hanging their heads out the window.

The Japanese automaker showed off a "Dog Friendly" version of the Honda Element SUV at the New York International Auto Show on Thursday. The concept features a cushioned pet bed with safety restraints in the cargo area, a spill-resistant water bowl, and even a ventilation fan to keep canines comfortable. A folding ramp gives animals an easy way to get in and out.

In the back seat, there's an integrated pet carrier and machine-washable seat covers to make it convenient and safe to carry smaller pets. The rubber floor mats feature a toy-bone pattern, and paw-print emblems on the side and back of the vehicle draw attention to its pet-friendly status.

Honda says it's still finalizing the features, but the Dog Friendly Element will be available this fall.

"Pets have become more like family, more important to households than ever before," said James Jenkins, a senior product planner for Honda. "We felt this was the perfect vehicle to offer such dog friendly features."

The Element already is appealing to pet owners because of features such as its easy-to-clean flooring in the cargo area and its wide doors.

Honda showed an interest in pets through the "Wonderful Openhearted Wagon" concept the company unveiled in 2005. That demonstration model included pet-friendly materials, a place for small animals to ride right up front, and a larger pet carrier that popped up from the floor in the back seat. Pet owners quickly started clamoring for Honda to put the features into production, Jenkins said.

The new Element may help Honda find a powerful niche market to revive sales of the Element, which are down 61 percent in the first three months of this year.

It's no secret that pet owners are willing to open their pocketbooks to pamper their pooches. There are about 75 million dogs in the U.S., and the market for pet products and services totaled more than $43 billion last year, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association.

Pricing for the Dog Friendly Element hasn't been disclosed, but standard versions of the vehicle start around $21,000, including destination charges.

This photo came to me via e-mail today. Here's the text from this literate pooch:

I just read in The Roanoke Times about my buddy, Doug White, bringing in his "Niner Delta Whiskey" after the captain collapsed. What a hero!
 
Sparky
 
(submitted by Sparky's best friend, Marty Davidson of Huddleston; click on Doug White's name above to read the story that inspired Sparky's e-mail. )

OK, who wants pancakes?

Click here for one of the best deals you will find for a weekend breakfast: All-you-can-eat pancakes at Applebee's in Bonsack this Saturday from 7 to 9 a.m. for $5.

That's right, all you need is a five-spot to enjoy all the hotcakes, sausage and coffee your tummy can hold. Proceeds benefit the Roanoke Valley SPCA.

The restaurant is on Challenger Avenue in front of Lowes and Wal-Mart, about a mile from the new Kroger store.

This story broke over the weekend and I think you would have to be completely unplugged from the media not to have heard that the Obama family have a new puppy, a 6-month-old Portuguese water dog that the girls renamed Bo.

OK, who wouldn't want to cuddle this adorable little fuzzball?

The Washington Post and the Web site TMZ both claim credit for breaking the story. The Post also produced a story that includes maybe a little too much background information about Bo's beginnings, and included a nice gallery of presidential pets from many administrations.

The Obamas had said they wanted to adopt a dog from a shelter or a rescue, but daughter Malia's allergies limited their choices to dogs that with little dander, and a Portie, a breed seldom found at a shelter, fills that bill nicely.

The Obamas have pledged to make a donation to a D.C.-area shelter.

The Happy Wag hopes the first family will enjoy their new dog.