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WATCH: Red Deer science dogs help save lost pet

Red Deer science-communicating dogs Bunsen and Beaker helped rescue a missing pet last weekend.
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Red Deer dogs Bunsen and Beaker helped save a missing pet recently. The two dogs have more than 80,000 followers on Twitter. (Contributed photo)

Red Deer science-communicating dogs Bunsen and Beaker helped rescue a missing pet last weekend.

Jason Zackowski, a science teacher at Lindsay Thurber Comprehensive High School, and his wife Kris were walking their two famous dogs, when Bunsen wandered down into an area with a frozen creek bed.

“Normally he comes back when you call him, but he wasn’t listening. Then he came back out and stood in a prominent position,” said Zackowski.

“He found eight moose legs last winter … so I thought he found another part of a moose or deer. But when we went down there to get him, there was another dog. Bunsen was looking at the dog and he wasn’t leaving until we acknowledged this dog was down there.”

Zackowski said it was apparent the dog was in distress.

“It could barely stand. It was super weak. So our whole family came together to save this dog,” he said.

READ MORE: Red Deer science teacher and his dogs combat COVID-19 misinformation

Bunsen and Beaker were brought back home and Zackowski’s son Adam came to help.

“We got a leash on the dog, but it was too weak to stand and walk. I stayed with it while Adam ran back and got a sled – we thought with a sled we’d be able to lead the dog out of there,” he said.

“While that was happening, my wife was back at home uploading pictures and videos I took to lost dog websites in the area. In the process of my son and I working up the dog’s courage to get into the sled, she found the owner of the dog.”

The family eventually got the dog into the sled and pulled it back to their home, which was about three kilometres away. About an hour later, the dog’s owner showed up.

“There are so many reasons why a dog can slip out of someone’s grasp. Nobody should judge another owner who has a dog that goes missing,” he said.

“What I thought was, ‘What if this dog was Bunsen or Beaker?’ I would hope somebody does everything to save the dog, because they’re part of your family.”

READ MORE: Red Deer teacher engages students with ‘cool’ science experiments

Zackowski said he’s proud of Bunsen for finding the missing dog.

“On our property, he’s somewhat of a watchdog. If a random dog came onto our property he would probably let us know if there was something up with that dog. But I think he knew something with this missing dog was not well and he was very kind with it. We’re super proud of him, he’s a good boy,” he said.

Bunsen and Beaker have more than 80,000 followers on Twitter. They can be found at twitter.com/bunsenbernerbmd.



sean.mcintosh@reddeeradvocate.com

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Sean McIntosh

About the Author: Sean McIntosh

Sean joined the Red Deer Advocate team in the summer of 2017. Originally from Ontario, he worked in a small town of 2,000 in Saskatchewan for seven months before coming to Central Alberta.
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