Real Life/Heartwarming/Animals

• Ana Julia Torres, who runs an animal shelter, restored a malnourished African lion back to health. Now the two share a very close bond, regularly exchanging hugs and kisses.
• Enter Christian the Lion, the all-time reigning champion of Real Life animal-related tear jerkers. 'Nuff said.
• When otters want to float on the water for a long time (for example, when they sleep), they hold hands. Otters literally hold hands.
• This video of a dog risking his/her life to drag another dog to safety after the other dog had been hit by a car. The hero dog apparently ran off and disappeared somewhere after the incident, but that doesn't make it any less touching.
• Pretty much any picture of a dog and cat together, despite their history of being enemies. You can find some pictures here, here and here.
  • These two videos of two different dogs adopting a litter of kittens.
  • Even more astounding are these two, which show a mother cats adopting a bunny and a squirrel, respectivley. Pure squee overload.
  • Not to mention this video that shows several animal friendships of two different species.
  • And this one too. The song "Why Can't We Be Friends?" by Smash Mouth fits excellently with the video.
  • Another video here, also showing the friendship between humans and animals and between different animals.
  • How has this squirrel not been mentioned? The story accompanying it is adorable. A cat adopting an injured squirrel? All together now: D'AWWWWWWWWWW!
• One word: Hachiko
  • One more word: Shep
  • Two more: Greyfriars Bobby
• This article on Mental_floss shows videos of soldiers returning home from overseas to be greeted by their wildly enthusiastic dogs. NGL, this troper cried.
  • The U.S. military authorities don't like it when troops adopt animals they find in battle zones, especially when they want to send the animals home to their families. Pets were abandoned or killed when their humans were shipped home. Until SPCA International stepped in in 2007 at the request of Sgt. Edward Watson and his dog Charlie. They handle the vaccines, the paperwork, the supplies, everything that's needed to get these animals to the homes of the soldiers' families in the States. Soon after Charlie was saved, the Associated Press carried the story of Spc. Gwen Beberg and her dog Ratchet and the money began pouring in. Operation Baghdad Pups, in defiance of U.S. military policy, has saved countless lives and reunited our men and women in uniform with their buddies. Just have a look at this. And this.
• The story of Tad (Short for The Abandoned Dog/Totally Awesome Dog). Tad was found by the side of the road, in horrible condition- bleeding from multiple wounds (most of them badly infected), dehydrated and near-starving, sporting two kinds of mange, infested with two kinds of worms, his claws ingrown, and his skin dry and cracking. The vet tech who found him immediately took him home and gave him food, water, and pain medication, and made a blog to chronicle her efforts to help him, with a Paypal link if anyone wanted to help pay for the vet bills. Three months of dedication on his new owner's part and donations on the readers' later, Tad was happy, healthy, rambunctious, and had enough Cheez-Wiz to last a lifetime. tl;dr
• Discovery Channel documentary "World's Toughest Tribes" has an episode on the Park Rangers at Virunga National Park. The whole episode is a Crowning Moment of Awesome as well as a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming, but especially towards the end, the leader of the Rangers starts talking about the mountain gorillas he is protecting, and how one he previously worked with recognised him after a long period of seperation. The obvious love and affection in his voice while talking about these animals is startling and heartwarming, especially considering the violent and hard life these men lead. It restored my faith in Humanity. I salute you, Eli Mundema, wherever you are.
• This video has a National Geographic photographer work in the Antarctic where he finds this gigantic leopard seal. The seal moves up to the guy, does some threat displays (which freaks him the hell out, since this thing's jaws are twice as big as a grizzly bear's), but then she goes over and grabs a penguin then offers it to his camera (likely thinking it the face). The penguin swims away, so the seal tries again. After the scenario repeats itself several times with the seal becoming more and more disgusted with the camera's ineptitude, something dawns on her and she becomes more and more panicked because she thinks that the creature she's offering penguins to is hurt. So she offers him injured penguins, and dead penguins, and eats a penguin to show him how its done and offers a dismembered penguin to try and feed him... one hopes they made a modification to the camera so it could fake eating the penguin and soothe the leopard seal's worries.
  • Touching as that is, I, for one, never expected to see a paragraph involving killing, eating, and dismembering penguins to be listed as a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming.
    • It is pretty touching, since the leopard seal kept trying to feed the camera for four days. Except for the poor penguins.
    • Probably the first "Heartwarming Fridge Horror" ever posted on TV Tropes. Impressive.
• This trailer for the African Cats movie. It's incredibly moving to see the lengths that a mother animal will go to protect her family. It just goes to show that love isn't exclusive to humans.
• This GIF. A mischievous young chimpanzee pushes its younger sibling/cousin into a canal and no less than three adults immediately rush over to pull out and comfort the baby. They really are non-human people.
• The entire The Cat who went to Paris series. Norton showed almost unconditional love to all he came across, and even managed to earn a moment of silence on the radio when he died, now that is one loving cat.
• The story about the crow and the stray kitten. No, you read that right. The crow visited the cat for four years until he/she was certain the cat would be okay without protection. The cat now lives with the old man in the video and is 10.
• US Marines cuddle with adorable kittens in Afghanistan. They rescued these babies and sent them off to their families' homes in the States. They were helped by Nowzad, another great rescue group.
• This video of 2 baby kittens being rescued from a storm drain.
  • Adorable, but can also serve as horror for kitty-loving tropers who fear this happening to their babies.
• This one. Not cinematic trickery.
  • Er... Actually, yes, it is cinematic trickery. That clip is from an old movie called The Adventures of Milo and Otis. It's an adorable movie though.
• This troper just saw a news story showed how a banker helped a family of ducks off a high ledge to the river, first catching the ducklings as they jumped off the edge, then leading them through crowds all the way to the river. It's equal parts sweet and heartwarming.
  • And here it is!
• Oscar the bionic cat gets new feet. "He's not supposed to be able to [climb] on the first day! :3" More recent footage - he's completely adapted to the feet, which also look like adorable spats.
• This is all the proof needed to demonstrate that Crowning Moments of Heartwarming amongst friends aren't limited to the human race. Try watching this without going, "AWWWWWWWW!" I dare you.
  • "This video contains content from Sony Music Entertainment, who has blocked it in your country on copyright grounds." Tell us the friggin' title or something. I dare you.
    • Not the original troper, but: a tortoise flips over a friend who is stuck on his back.
    • User:Alex Sora 89 to the rescue! Everything is as follows.

Video: "Tortoise helps friend who's flipped over." Uploader: "radicalgeetee". Description: "It's better to be a slow buddy, than to be a no buddy at all. Michael Bolton - Lean on me." Song: Michael Bolton - Lean on me. Alternate link: here.

• This news article. 38 chimpanzees, rescued from a lab after spending 30 years locked up, go outside for the first time.
• Video: A snake in a Japanese zoo becomes friends with a hamster who was supposed to be its meal.
• This turtle loves this cat. Also counts as a Crowning Moment of Funny because the cat is a Tsundere and tries to act like he doesn't care about the turtle.
• An injured and abandoned cat was rescued by the RSPCA in England. On realizing she was a nursing mother, after patching her up, they took her back where she'd been caught so she could go back to her kittens. When the cat was released, her response wasn't to run away, it was to very deliberately lead the rescue officer to the barn where she'd hidden her babies so he could collect them too.
• The story of Springer, the young orca. After her mother died, she got separated from her pod and wound up in Puget Sound, Washington. Emaciated and sick, she tried to alleviate her loneliness by coming up to boats and ferries and rubbing against them. Researchers compared her vocalizations to the various orca pods of Washington and British Columbia, and tracked down her immediate family; her grandmother, grandaunt, aunts, uncles and cousins. A joint Canadian-American operation was launched to first capture her, then treat her back to full health, and finally move and release her to Johnstone Strait, where she could rejoin her relatives. Since then, she has been seen every year with her family, being raised by her grandaunt, happy and healthy.
• Oskar the Blind Kitten: he was born without fully formed eyes. Yet he is still loved, well looked after and is able to enjoy himself like any other cat should.
• This article from Cracked. #1 also counts as a Tear Jerker.
• You think that all musicians who play Death Metal are cold, satanic and like to hurt or sacrifice animals? Wrong!
• There's a show on the National Geographic Channel called An Animal Saved My Life, dedicated to nothing but how animals came to various members of our own kind in their hour of need. Gems include:

A male silverback gorilla who protected a child after he fell into the enclosure. An elephant who carried a young girl away from the tsunami in Thailand in 2004.

• The Lazarus taxom.