Poodle-Mix Mistaken for Lion in Virginia // Prompts Numerous 911 Calls!!

Daniel Painter of Norfolk, VA, is a fan of Old Dominion University so much that he decided to have his Labrador/poodle mix -- Charles the Monarch -- groomed to look like the college's lion mascot. And it's a pretty good likeness, as you can tell from his pic. People in his community recently began calling the police about a small lion loose in the community after a recent grooming:

A coiffed pooch mistaken for a lion’s cub is causing quite an uproar in Virginia. Charles the dog was frolicking down the streets in Norfolk, minding his own business, when panicked passers-by started calling 911.

“I’d like to report a lion sighting,” a caller says. 

“Say that again?” a dispatcher responds.

A few minutes later, another call came in. “I just saw an animal that looked like a small lion,” a man says. “Had the mane and everything … I don’t know if it got away from the zoo, or what.”

And the flurry continued, including one resident who tells the dispatcher that the “baby lion” is the size of a Labrador retriever.

According to this report, the police received enough calls that they decided to check in with the local zoo to make sure that no lions were missing.

I'm pretty sure I would noticed that Charles is a dog and not a lion if I were to see him on the streets, but I'm also pretty sure that I would need to do a double-take to make certain!