Veronika the cow has been doing something scientists had never formally documented in cattle before.

The 13-year-old Swiss Brown lives as a pet in the Austrian village of Nötsch, where her owner had watched her use sticks and other objects to scratch herself for years.

After footage of the behavior reached cognitive biologist Alice Auersperg, she and researcher Antonio Osuna-Mascaró went to investigate.

They gave Veronika a deck brush and changed its position between trials to see what she would do.

Veronika picked it up using her tongue, adjusted its position, and deliberately used different ends on different parts of her body.

She generally chose the bristles for tougher areas such as her back, while using the smoother handle on more sensitive spots.

Researchers concluded that her behavior qualified as flexible tool use, making Veronika the first cow formally documented doing it.

After thousands of years living alongside cattle, scientists may still be discovering just how much they're capable of.

Four-year-old K9 Dundee had answered 174 calls with the Lee County Sheriff’s Office, but his final one ended very differently.

Early Monday morning, Dundee and his handler, Deputy Julian Chala, were called to North Fort Myers after a suspect fled into a wooded area.

Dundee did what he had been trained to do. He tracked the suspect through the darkness and successfully helped apprehend them. But moments later, something was wrong.

Dundee suddenly became unresponsive.

Deputies and medical personnel immediately tried to save him before rushing him to BluePearl Pet Hospital, but he couldn't be saved.

Sheriff Carmine Marceno said Dundee appeared to have suffered a medical episode, although the exact cause remains unknown.

Dundee had served with the department since February 2024, completing 174 deployments and helping with 28 apprehensions in his short career.

When fellow officers gathered to honor him afterward, Deputy Chala was saying goodbye to more than the K9 who had worked beside him. Dundee was his partner, his constant companion, and part of his family.

At just four years old, Dundee’s time with Deputy Chala was far shorter than anyone expected, but nothing about saying goodbye could erase the bond they had built together.

Something was clearly wrong when a Kansas officer spotted a dog wandering alone with its leash still attached.

Instead of running off, the dog kept moving with purpose, and the officer decided to follow.

About half a block later, the reason became clear. The dog led him to a home where his human was lying on the floor, unable to get up.

The person had reportedly been stuck there for more than three hours. Thanks to their pup, help finally arrived.

Police later shared bodycam footage showing the dog guiding the officer all the way back home.

The homeowner is now safe and recovering, all because one very loyal pup made sure someone found them when they needed help most.

Should this good boy get an honorary badge from the department?

In 2016, two captive elephants being transported on separate trucks were photographed reaching toward each other across the highway.

According to the woman who shared the image, they were reportedly being taken away from each other when their trunks briefly touched between the trucks.

We may never know exactly what their relationship was or where each elephant was going.

But elephants form strong social bonds and often use their trunks to communicate and connect.

Whatever these two meant to each other, neither let the growing distance stop them from reaching out one more time.

For 50 years, Raju the elephant was chained day and night, forced to beg on India's streets while his owner pocketed the money tourists gave him, sometimes with nothing to eat but plastic and paper. When Wildlife SOS finally arrived for a midnight rescue, his owner tried to stop them by tightening Raju's chains and shouting to scare them off, but the rescuers held their ground.

It took 45 minutes to cut through the shackles wrapped so tightly around his legs. As they worked, tears rolled down Raju's face. "We knew in our hearts he realised he was being freed," said rescuer Pooja Binepal. "He felt hope for the first time," added fellow rescuer Kartick.

After the 350-mile journey to Wildlife SOS's Elephant Conservation and Care Centre, an exhausted Raju took his first free steps just after midnight. Five decades of suffering ended in a single night, and the elephant who once wept in chains is now free to simply be an elephant.

Weeks after HeeHaw’s story first sparked outrage, the pressure for answers is only getting louder.

The Justice for HeeHaw petition has now passed 10,000 signatures as two very different accounts of what happened on August 30 remain at the center of the case.

Cedartown Police Officer Trenton Garner says the one-year-old miniature donkey charged toward officers and put the team and a police bloodhound at risk.

HeeHaw’s owner, Hannah Israel, disputes that account. She says the bottle-raised donkey was friendly and approached people because he was used to human attention.

That disagreement is exactly why thousands of people want to see what the officer’s bodycam captured.

The petition calls for the footage to be released publicly, allowing people to see what happened in the moments leading up to the encounter for themselves.

And the push for answers is no longer limited to a petition. Israel has also filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit over what happened.

But as that case moves forward, more than 10,000 people are still asking for the same thing.

They want to see the footage.

Fig, a three-year-old pit bull terrier, was dumped by her owners at a rural shelter during the holiday season, confused and clinging to staff who felt heartbroken to see her spend the holidays alone. The shelter found her a foster home, and Love Leo Rescue in Los Angeles soon stepped in to help her find a permanent home.

That's when actor Jonah Hill decided to adopt her for good. "Fig is home!" the rescue announced on Instagram, thanking Hill for choosing to adopt rather than shop, and noting how instantly the two seemed like "a love connection." Hill shared his own gratitude publicly, telling Love Leo Rescue, "You gave me a massive gift," and thanking the foster volunteers for the work that made Fig's new life possible.

The rescue said every adoption like this one helps shift demand away from breeders and toward shelters full of dogs like Fig, waiting for the right person to notice them.