My parents were... My mum was a grafter and my dad very imaginative. I hope I've inherited both those qualities.

The size of cages holding beagles awaiting experiments could be reduced under new Government proposals, animal welfare campaigners warned yesterday.

Dr Johnson was famously sniffy about dogs walking on their hind legs. So I'm not sure he'd have been entranced by Pudsey, the mop-haired pooch whose owner swept up a £500,000 prize at the weekend. Ashleigh Butler, who's 17, has trained her collie-cross to dance on his hind legs, and their barn-storming performance took them to victory in the final of Britain's Got Talent.

Notebook

Are you always disappointed with your holiday snaps?

It is the conservationist's catch-22: what to do when one endangered species eats another. Research by environmentalists shows that jaguars, themselves at risk of extinction, are increasingly preying on endangered turtle species.

It is the conservationist’s catch-22: what to do when one endangered species starts eating another. That is the problem facing environmentalists whose research shows that jaguars, themselves at risk of extinction, are increasingly preying on endangered turtle species.

A British tourist has spoken of her "nightmare" attack by two cheetahs when she tried to protect a young girl from the large cats.

Even the most minimally minded can't fail to be seduced by pattern this spring. Rebecca Gonsalves rounds up some of the finest on offer

We give them silly names, love to watch their antics and attach human characteristics to them. What is it about cats that makes them the most popular animals on the net?

The Monk (101 mins, 15)

A huge rise in the number of pet owners convicted of animal cruelty is pushing the RSPCA to “breaking point”, the charity said.

The curiousness of the dark in the night time