Puppy survives 25 days without food

A 6-month-old puppy managed to go for 25 days without food, local media in Henan province reported.

On Aug 10, the puppy, Ben Ben, followed its owner, a resident of Gongyi city in Henan, into a room in the third floor of the owner's house. The man was showing the room to two women who were looking for a place to rent, reported dahe.com, a major news website in Henan, on Thursday.

The owner locked the door to the room after the two women had left and didn't notice they had left Ben Ben inside.

The dog was in the room for the next 25 days, staying alive by eating it own excrement and wood and cotton from a sofa in the room, as well as drinking rainwater that leaked in through the house's roof, according to the owner's wife, who discovered Ben Ben on Tuesday when she was leading potential renters to the room.

When he was found, Ben Ben, now noticeably skinny, was lying on the floor and couldn't stand up, she said, adding that the dog had lost nearly half of its weight.

According to Xu Xinjie, a researcher at the Henan Zoological Society, a dog can survive for seven days at the most without food and water. The smaller a dog is, the longer it will survive.