A child plays with a cat next to a makeshift animal shelter at Cihangir neighbourhood in Istanbul, Turkey, Thursday, March 23, 2023. Turan comes every single day with cat food in his hand to the makeshift shelter he helped build with the other volunteers in the area and takes care of the needs of the cats that reside their every single day. (Photo by Francisco Seco/AP Photo)

A lizard wears a cowboy hat at Pet Expo Thailand on May 06, 2023 in Bangkok, Thailand. Dogs take part in a skateboarding competition at Pet Expo Thailand, a four day exhibition held at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center. Dogs were judged on form and agility and separated into novice and experienced categories. Placing first place in the novice category was Mui and first in the experienced category was Suradej. Both house pets and exotic animals were featured at the expo, with visitors and their pets able to interact with them. (Photo by Lauren DeCicca/Getty Images)

Zappa, a toothless 15-year-old Italian greyhound that looks surprisingly like Sid the Sloth from the animated movie Ice Age, is redefining dog beauty. Owners Sadie and Rosalie Millen, of Pewaukee, Wisconsin, say that Zappa started sticking her tongue out a few years ago when she lost her teeth.

At the end of rice harvesting season, the folks of the Kagawa and Niigata Prefectures in Japan hold a straw festival to celebrate the abundance of the harvest. Dried straws cover wooden frames to form larger-than-life sculptures from animals like sharks and gorillas to vessels such as ships and tanks. The family-friendly event invites visitors of all ages to engage, interact, and play on the enormous structures.

Edinburgh-based physicist-turned-web-designer Tom Beddard was inspired by geometry to create these virtual Fabergé fractals – made up of self-repeating patterns, so that structures within the object resemble the whole. “Within a 3D fractal, there is infinite detail”, says Beddard, 37. “The closer you zoom in, the more structure is revealed”. Beddard rendered the fractals using WebGL, a technology used to animate 3D scenes in a browser.

A 500-pound lion and an 11-pound dog have formed an unlikely friendship, proving that cats and dogs really can get along. Bonedigger the lion and Milo the dachshund live together at Garold Wayne Exotic Animal Park in Wynnewood, Okla., along with three other dogs. The puppies were introduced to Bonedigger in 2008 when he was just a 4-week-old cub.

About a dozen dogs traded in their leashes for life vests Saturday for the chance to ride the waves at Jupiter beach as part of a canine surfing competition to raise money for an animal rescue group. Photo: Musso paddles in with Jengo. (Photo by Taylor Jones/The Palm Beach Post)