Life with the original TroubleMaker has been way too easy as she has turned two and is such a good girl! What else could we do but bring home another family member?
The TroubleMaker (aka Pascha) is Noah’s dog. She turned two in August. This time, Sarah wanted a puppy of her own!
We’ve had many rescues over the years and generally we tend to gravitate towards those. But we decided not to get a rescue dog at this point in our lives as we have a baby in our family and wanted to know just how any doggie members were raised.
We also wanted a very smart breed, but not too large. We’ve been looking for a while when we finally came across a litter of farm stock puppies.
Dani’s father is a Welsh Sheepdog and her mother is Australian Shepherd/Border Collie. These are all very, very active breeds! I had an Australian Shepherd Mix for about 15 years so I’m very familiar with the joys (and the pains!) of raising a herding breed!
German Shepherds are also herding breeds, although they herd a bit differently!
The puppy owners immediately asked if we had stock dogs experience. They were disappointed she would not be a working dog on a farm, but were very happy to here we are heavily involved in 4H and that Dani would have dog project training this year and Sarah would compete with her in dog shows as well. A busy stock dog is a good stock dog!
We drove out to the farm where the litter of puppies lived along with both doggie parents, the grandpa, an aunt and an uncle. All of the dogs work on the farm and are of the three different breeds I mentioned. We were able to interact with the mom/dad/grandpa/uncle/aunt and see just how smart and friendly they all were!
There were three puppies left from the litter – two males and a female. We had already decided we most likely wanted a female. Sarah also felt she was the cutest of the three, and also the friendliest (although also the most active!).
Of course, there was very little chance we were going to visit the farm and NOT come home with a puppy!
Sarah named her Dani in the car on the way home. Even though it was over an hour’s drive home, there was no car sickness and no accidents – yay!
So we are back in the midst of housetraining a new puppy and trying to keep her from chewing everything in sight (including us!). So far she’s settling in really well and getting the hang of things quickly! It sure does help to have the TroubleMaker around to show her the ropes and try to keep her out of trouble!
Would I recommend these breeds as good pets? Well, yes and no. We all work from home except for Sarah (who works part time and goes to college as well). So someone is here watching Dani day and night. We do not leave new puppies alone the first couple of months and we all take turns looking out for her when Sarah has to work or go to school. The Troublemaker (Pascha) plays with her a lot as do the rest of us so she doesn’t have a lot to get into trouble! If you have a home where the puppy would be left home alone most of the day, this probably is not the breed for you! They need to be busy, busy busy!
