Caped Crusade : Holy canines! Former Boy Wonder runs orphanage for dumped Danes

Sure, it’s not the same as saving Gotham City from the Joker’s machinations, but Burt Ward--Robin in the ‘60s TV classic “Batman”--is out to save Great Danes. That’s right, those lumbering, adorable, pony-sized dogs that stand taller than some trees.

Ward and his wife, Tracy, founded and still fund the largest Great Dane rescue in the country, located on their five-acre estate in Riverside County. The couple were moved to their mission after they adopted two Danes, only to discover that others they’d cuddled were later destroyed. Up to 150 Danes--fawns like Marmaduke, blue Bostons like Astro on “The Jetsons,” harlequins, chocolate merles a la Scooby Doo--are kept and cared for by the Wards until adoption. Their pledge: No Dane should lose his life for lack of a home.

“That means we’ll have any dog shipped here, we’ll pay any medical expense,” says Ward, who footed a $10,000 medical bill for one. That also means 600 pounds of food a day, a separate air-conditioned house for the dogs and a staff of five. “All of which costs, out of pocket, about $100,000 a year,” Ward estimates. (Helping defray those costs is Logical Figments Inc., the post-production facility for feature animation and special effects Tracy Ward owns and operates.)

The Wards place about 500 Great Danes a year under strict rules. Of the 100-odd prospective owners who call each day, only about 2% qualify (a $400 fee is charged per dog, which helps weed out the idly curious). A mandatory contract stipulates that the dogs must sleep inside and cannot be sold, traded or given away but instead must be returned to the Wards’ Danes rescue. “Most people don’t realize Great Danes are indoor dogs--they have the thin skin of a Chihuahua,” Ward says. “I don’t care if you have a $2,000 doghouse, this dog sleeps inside.”

Still, look into the puppy-dog eyes of these enormous hounds and the question begs asking: Are the Wards not just a bit obsessed? Ward, who no longer resembles the “golly jeepers” Boy Wonder, looks bemused: “We always say we’ve just gone to the dogs.”