Dog which had plastic container stuck on his head for three weeks rescued by residents

A wayward black Labrador is alive, thanks in no small part to three southern Minnesota residents who captured the scared animal and pulled a plastic container off his head. Katherine Nelson of Madison Lake says that she, her husband Don and their friend Sue Leach of St. Peter had been trying to capture the lab, who they nicknamed Jughead, for three days after hearing he had been spotted running around a North Mankato park with the container on his head, unable to eat and drink.

Police said he had been stuck in the plastic container for three weeks, and the Nelsons and Leach feared that he would not last much longer. Nelson says they set a live trap with food in it, but that strategy didn't work. Finally, on Wednesday morning they went to check the trap and saw dog tracks in the newly fallen snow. They followed the tracks to a brush-filled swampy area, and saw that the dog was sleeping.
Don Nelson crept up on him so the dog wouldn't wake, then scooped him up. The lab struggled to get away for a short time, but didn't have the strength to resist. They loaded him up in their van and took the tired dog to Minnesota Valley Pet Hospital. "He didn't have much time left," Katherine Nelson said of the emaciated pooch. "Someone would have walked up and found him dead." The dog finally managed to wiggle free of the container while the Nelsons were unloading him at the vet.

Katherine describes his condition as dire, but says the folks at Minnesota Valley Pet Hospital are doing a great job, and are donating their services to nurse the starving lab back to health. She says he has soulful brown eyes, and is handsome if shockingly skinny. When he is ready for discharge the dog will live at the Nelson's farm near Madison Lake so he can be socialized with their dogs and allowed to completely recover. At that time they will help find a great home for him, one with a fenced in yard as police reports suggest that the dog may have been on his own for a year or more.