dogs? world?

so i joined my world, i was mining and when i finished and went to the surface to see my beautiful dogs, EVERYTHING was glitched. I saw a weird crab like creature (as seen as the first screen shot) i was really freaked out by this because it was an mod, as it swam around in the little pond,

when i got to my house i was greeted with this
i wasn't sure what was happening so i ran to these forums and i found out someone said "if you raise the render distance, the new chunks flash rapidly with distorted everything" and i remembered i had raised the chunks, so i lowered them and then i realized.... the crab like thing was my dogs... i had to kill them to make the glitchyness go away... i actually feel bad for killing my only 3 dogs i had since the beginning.... but the real question is... was it 1.8 that corrupted pet dogs? i had all of their collars dyed... please anyone with pet dogs out there.... do not feel bad killing the monstrosity that now is your dog... Mojang, please fix this