2/09Number of Iraqi stray dogs that Operation Baghdad Pups has helped emigrate to the United States since 2003: 66
Number currently on the waiting list: 50
2/09Minimum number of Americans since January 2008 who have purchased stem-cell therapy for their dogs: 1,196
11/08Margin by which U.S. dog owners favor John McCain over Barack Obama: 43–34
4/06Number of dogs that a California clinic trained to diagnose cancer by sniffing patients’ breath: 5
2/06Estimated amount spent in the United States each year to treat ACL injuries in dogs: $1,320,000,000
Page on which the Gainesville Sun ran the story: A1
12/05Minimum number of insurgent attacks in Iraq since November 2003 using explosive-carrying dogs or donkeys: 6
10/05Amount that Oakland residents can now be fined if their dog has not been implanted with an ID microchip: $100
9/03Number of females on the American Film Institute’s list of the fifty greatest movie villains, aliens included: 15
Number on its list of the fifty greatest movie heroes, Lassie included: 7
6/03Ratio of the top weekly fee paid a Munchkin in 1939’s The Wizard of Oz to the weekly fee paid for Toto: 4:5
5/01Length, in millimeters, of an I.D. microchip that Singapore now implants in the necks of all imported dogs: 13
3/00Number of Parisians who break bones or are hospitalized each year after slipping on dog feces: 650
1/00Number of New York City children issued Civil Defense dog tags by 1952 to identify them after a nuclear attack: 2,500,000
6/99Number of pups that Bob Dole’s dog Leader has sired with Strom Thurmond’s dog Chelsea Marie: 8
5/99Days the President should spend in jail “simply for hitting on a dog like” Paula Jones, according to O.J. Simpson: 30
12/99Number of dogs and whores of whom Yasir Arafat is the son, according to Syria’s defense minister: 120,000
4/98Amount that the Paula Jones Legal Fund has spent since 1994 on “pet care” for a dog named Mitzie: $95
12/98Fee that an anonymous family has paid Texas A&M University to clone their pet collie mix, Missy: $2,300,000
10/97Chances that an American who contracted the plague last year was infected by fleas from a prairie dog: 2 in 5
7/95Maximum price of a three-year license to sell hot dogs outside New York City’s Metropolitan Museum of Art: $900,600
5/93Number of registered dogs in Los Angeles named Aaron Spelling: 1
1/93Price of an eight-week course in acting for dogs, including room and board, at the Kamer Canine College in L.A.: $4,150
4/91Number of beagles used in radiation research that the Department of Energy will bury in a toxic-waste dump in 1991: 850
2/91Estimated number of times last fall that George Bush told a joke about his dog asking for a wine list with her Alpo: 10
12/91Amount the city of Montreal will spend this year on a rest room for dogs in William Bowie Park: $34,000
11/90Prairie dogs shot at the Top Dog World Championship Prairie Dog Shoot held in Nucla, Colorado, last July: 2,956
7/89Rank of dog, cat, snake, and U.S. president, among World Book Encyclopedia entries consulted most often: 1,2,3,4
4/89Percentage of Americans who like dogs on TV commercials because they are “more exciting than people”: 23
8/88Price of dyeing a dog pink at the Village Dawg Shoppe in Rockville Centre, New York (with shampoo and cut): $87
7/88Bounty that drug smugglers are rumored to have put on Barco, a U.S. Border Patrol drug-sniffing dog: $30,000
6/88Percentage of dogs that are overweight: 40
6/88Price of Video Dog, a tape offering the “experience of owning a pet without the mess and inconvenience”: $19.95
11/88Value of the narcotics that the U.S. Border Patrol’s 3,200 agents detected this year, per agent: $123,758
Value of the narcotics that the Patrol’s 24 drug-sniffing dogs detected this year, per dog: $4,696,574
5/86Corporate sponsors of the recent dog-sled expedition to the North Pole: 65