“[N]othing else mattered except for Jimmy and I getting married with Bear” šā¤ļøļø
By Caitlin Jill Anders
Published on July 21, 2023 at 1:42 PM
Cat Kukla and Bear have been best friends since she spotted him at a shelter when she was a kid. Bear is now 17 years old and has accomplished so much, but thereās one thing Kukla still hoped heād be around to do.
āGrowing up, I was not very āgirlyā and hadnāt ever dreamt of a wedding like most little girls did, but I had dreamed of Bear being a part of my wedding, in a little red wagon, since I could remember,ā Kukla told The Dodo.
vet wedding
VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center
Kukla met her now husband Jimmy in 2011, and he soon came to love Bear just as much as she did. He even brought Bear to visit her every weekend while she was away at college. Bear became a huge part of the coupleās life together, and they hoped that he would be around for as long as possible.
In 2018, Bear started experiencing some health issues, and a week before the couple was supposed to get married, he took a turn for the worse. Kukla was beside herself that Bear might not be at her wedding the way sheād always dreamed of, so, together with Jimmy, she made a decision.
āI asked Jimmy if he thought we should get married at the vet to ensure Bear would be there with us,ā Kukla said. āHis response was, āIād marry you any day, any time.āā
vet wedding
VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center
Bear was being treated at the VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center, and they were overjoyed when they learned the couple wanted to hold their wedding there. Everyone in the coupleās life came together to get things ready in a hurry. It was so important to everyone who knew him that Bear got to be there to see his parents get married, no matter what.
On the day of the impromptu wedding, Bear was a little groggy but still seemed ready to witness his parents take that beautiful step.
vet wedding
VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center
āWe ended up finding a picture on the wall that looked a lot like Bear and figured that was the best spot for the ceremony,ā Kukla said. āBear was brought in and placed on his wagon and sat there as alert as he could be during our short ceremony. Following the ceremony, Bear actually got up and walked around outside, which he hadnāt done in days, and he walked a lot!ā
vet wedding
VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center
Bear summoned the energy to be present for his parents’ big day, and after the wedding, he miraculously started to improve. The couple got married again as planned a week later, but their wedding ceremony at the vet practice with Bear will always hold such a special place in their hearts.
vet wedding
VCA Veterinary Emergency Service & Veterinary Specialty Center
Bearās health has unfortunately taken a turn again, and his parents are doing everything they can to get him back on track. They love Bear so much and would do absolutely anything for him, and if they had to, theyād hold their wedding at the vet hospital all over again.
dog
Cat Kukla
āThinking about the year and a half of stress and wedding planning, it was so wonderful to know that nothing else mattered except for Jimmy and I getting married with Bear,ā Kukla said.
If you’d like to help Bear, you can make a donation to his medical care.
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Daily DodoWildlife
Woman On Beach Stroll Stumbles Upon Rare Purple Animal Not Seen In A Decade
She was shocked.
By Alana Francis-Crow
This past summer, a San Diego, California, resident named Anya Stajner was taking an evening stroll down the beach in La Jolla when she spotted something purple in the sand. As she looked more closely, she realized it was a little snail.
If anyone else had spotted the purple snail, they might have admired it for a second and moved on. But Stajner isnāt your average beach stroller ā she happens to be a PhD candidate at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
Stajner quickly identified the animal as a Janthina, a snail typically found only in warm tropical waters. Stajner was shocked ā sheād never seen a Janthina in California before.
āIām ā¦ overjoyed that my knowledge about marine zooplankton led me to immediately recognize these specimens as Janthina and to understand how rare it would be to stumble across them on the beach in San Diego,ā Stajner wrote on Instagram.
While most marine snails live on the sea floor, Janthina actually live in the open ocean. They use a special mucus bubble raft to help them float upside down on the waterās surface, where they feed on invertebrates like Portuguese man oā war. Even their bright coloring helps them thrive in their unique habitat.
āItās believed that their violet shells have their vibrant color because it protects the Janthina from the harsh UV rays itās exposed to at the surface,ā Stajner wrote on Instagram.
Stajner transported a few of the snails sheād found on the beach back to a lab at Scripps Institution of Oceanography to have a closer look at them. There, she confirmed with her fellow oceanographers that there hadnāt been a documented Janthina spotting in San Diego for ten years.
So what were these Janthina doing so far from home? No one knows for sure, but itās most likely related to changing ocean temperatures. On the day Stajner found the Janthina, sheād noticed that the water had felt unusually hot.
ā[T]heir stranding along the Southern California coast is often linked to warmer offshore waters flowing toward the shore,ā Scripps Institution of Oceanography wrote on Instagram.
Only time will tell whether Stajnerās Janthina sighting was a fluke or a sign of their habitat range shifting. Either way, Stajner is glad to have encountered the fascinating animals.
āI feel so lucky to have stumbled upon these striking ocean creatures who live such a unique lifestyle,ā Stajner wrote.
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