Move over Bear Grylls, there's a new four-legged survival specialist in town - a Cairn Terrier named Maisie who survived eight days in the snow of Suffolk.
Now safe and sound and no doubt enjoying plenty of dog food and other treats, for a long time Margaret Charles of Middleton feared her canine had perished in the cold weather.
The saga began back on January 16th, when Ms Charles was walking Maisie on Dunwich Heath.
After slipping on some black ice, she was helpless as her prized pooch ran off into the increasingly-cold wilderness nearby.
A subsequent search with a volunteer proved fruitless and as the temperatures dropped and the days rolled by, Ms Charles began to give up hope.
But in the kind of miracle usually reserved for the festive period, she received a phone call from Jenny Brown, a volunteer at canine rescue group Dog Lost saying she had discovered the pooch alive and well following a search involving her own tracker dog Tigger.
Speaking to EADT24, Ms Charles admitted she was "trembling and crying" when she heard that Maisie was okay, despite eight days in the cold.
"She was found not far from where I fell but her retractable lead had got caught a tree meaning she couldn’t walk any further but the main thing was she was okay," she told the news provider.
The Wiltshire Fire and Rescue Service has previously urged pet owners to take extra care with pets in snowy weather conditions.
