Pegasus was rescued from an unscrupulous backyard breeder when she was 4 weeks old. The buoyant Great Dane puppy suffered from a pigment deficiency that's often associated with blindness and deafness. Most of her siblings were deformed or had already died.

Her rescuer, South African filmmaker Dave Meinert, was told Pegasus didn't have long to live, either. Even if she did survive, Pegasus was expected to eventually lose her sight and hearing. "So I decided to record every day we had left," Meinert explains in the video above, which weaves those daily portraits into a heartwarming time-lapse look at Pegasus growing up.

Meinert and animal behaviorist Kieron Piper trained Pegasus to use a treadmill, offering her a controlled avenue for exercise even if she does eventually go blind or deaf. Great Danes do a lot of growing in their first several months of life, and Meinert captured it beautifully as Pegasus trotted on her treadmill.

The video has plenty of potential for encouraging people to rescue pets rather than supporting breeders, but Meinert has an even simpler message in mind.

"I still don't know how long she is going to live," he notes in the video. "But right now is pretty great."

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