From Bill King at ajc.com:

Interim mascot Russ will keep the spiked collar on as the season opens Sept. 1 against Buffalo, the Savannah Morning News reports, quoting a member of the Sonny Seiler family that owns the Uga line. The Seilers offered no other details about the timetable for the naming of Uga IX, the paper reported. Charles Seiler, the mascots’ main caretaker, had expressed concern last year about subjecting a puppy to the early September heat and hinted the family might wait until later in the month to install the new mascot.