kangals

[kangals]

woahg

[kangals]

baby slide for babies

[kangals]

random question if you don’t mind humoring me!

[kangals]

took Stellina in for a PT check today bc I’ve noticed she seems to be a bit sensitive about her back being touched and not wanting to jump around much.

good news: while we did find some painful spots on her back and hip, it’s very mild and should be resolved/controlled with a few weeks of stretches and exercise

bad news: she weighs 49.7lbs 😬 which is 5-10lbs overweight depending on how kind you want to be. I’ve been spoiling her a bit to make up for the puppy, but alas… to the diet gulag with you.

[kangals]

i told myself i wouldn't get a dog after i moved out on my own but your collie propaganda has been wildly effective on me and is making me reconsider for further down the line when my housing situation is more permanent lmao. weewa and kep are such wonderful beasts and i can't thank you enough for sharing them with the world <3

#MORE COLLIES. #thank u im glad u enjoy them

[kangals]

Consider: the tiny little triangle eyes of the Collie

#gods most perfect creature

[kangals]

The S

[kangals]

hey i dont remember if you ever answered this, but are u planning on breeding or showing either of your dogs? pets to weewa and keppy and butterball <3

nah, i'm not interested in dog breeding + they're both limited registration. also i stole stellina's uterus years ago. kep's allowed to keep his balls for as long as he's not a jackass about them so no guarantees there.

no showing either, kep's cute but he wasn't held back as a show prospect for presumably a reason (plus i've already missed the window on getting his ears correct anyway) so he'll be doing just silly active pet things. he does have at least one (possibly more?) siblings that will be shown later, so i'll be interested to see how they turn out though! stellina's sister that was held back the breeder didn't end up showing, but she did tell me later that she thought stellina turned out very nice and could have finished an AKC championship which made me feel very smug. maybe it will be the same for kep!

#i am very vaguely interested in confo but it's just not something i have the energy/time/money to commit to rn #maybe next dog #also from what i know of keps breeder i think if i let him create any bastard collies she would drive to my house and beat me to death

[kangals]

what about a dog that can do all that a collie can but is under 30 lbs? shetland sheepdog has the look but are they actually anything like a collie? :o

I’m not super experienced with shelties (at least not well-bred ones) but I know I have some sheltie followers so I’ll let them chime in on this! In my (limited) experience though shelties are quite similar in temperament to collies. or keep in mind that small collie females can be around 40lbs (like Stellina is) so they do get fairly close to that weight range occasionally!

[kangals]

@kangals

She's also Extremely Formal and Dignified 🤣

#fluffy? long snout? likes to be upside down and stupid? yep thats a Certified Collie #ough tell her i love her

[kangals]

i feel kind of annoying for how much i tend to recommend collies whenever people ask for breed suggestions, but also i do think it's true! they are such awesome dogs that i think they get overlooked a lot and i need to do my part to spread the collie propaganda! like:

"i want a dog that's smart and easy to train" collie

"but i need a dog that won't go insane if i can't do high-level training or take a lazy day" collie

"i want a dog that i can do sports like agility, obedience, rally, barnhunt, nosework, etc with" collie

"i want a dog that i can train as a therapy dog or service dog prospect" collie

"i want a dog that i can take for long hikes and jogs and can keep up with me all day" collie

"but i don't want a high-energy or destructive dog" collie

"i want a dog that's good off-leash" collie

"i want a dog that gets along peacefully with other dogs, cats, and small animals" collie

"i want a dog that's friendly but not obsessed with making friends with strangers" collie

"i want a dog who will keep watch and alert me to any intruders on my property" collie

"but i don't want a dog who's a bite risk" collie

"i want a dog who's overall healthy and robust with a good lifespan and as few major health problems as possible" collie

"i want a dog who comes in different coat colors" collie

"but i don't want a long-haired dog or one that i have to groom a lot" smooth collie

GET IT TOGETHER, PEOPLE.

[kangals]

Does Kepler play tug with you? I remember you saying that Stellina has a super soft mouth and would just drop the toy if you tried to play tug with her, so I’m curious if he’s the same way. Also have you decided if you’re going to try any of the herding instinct stuff with Kepler? It was really cool seeing Stellina give it a try!

ah good memory! Kep will play tug a little bit but not really, in his case it’s not that he has a soft mouth (he does not, as my fingers can attest) but more so that he’s a typical herding dog and is much more interested in play with lots of movement (chase, fetch, flirt pole etc) than play that’s more stationary/force like tug or wrestling. Most of the time if I try to get him to tug he just prefers to grab the toy, drop it, grab it again, etc - I don’t think he has quite the attention span for “dig in and pull” haha.

I would definitely love to do some herding stuff with him though! I think he actually has a much stronger drive than Stellina does. He’s still a little too young to be put in with sheep but I’d definitely like to test him on stock. We’re also going to try some lure coursing soon, and possibly barnhunt if I can get around to it.

[kangals]

way back in 2014, probably a few weeks or months after you posted that picture of boone with the stick on his head, i checked your blog out and so dearly enjoyed all the dogposting that i followed. i think you were the first dogblr blog i actually followed at the time, but it's been ages and my memory is bad, so i'm not fully sure. it wasn't long before then--2012 i think?--that i had gotten a new dog of my own, a border collie. iirc he and boone were just about the same age.

in 2018 i lost that blog i'd followed you with, and a lot of connections with it. i didn't return until 2021, and when i did, i didn't refollow most of the old blogs; i don't think i even really went looking for them. it took me a while to get back into the swing of using tumblr.

last september, my border collie had a sharp health decline, and i had to say goodbye. it's not the first time i've had to put a pet down, but i think it was the hardest. i'm still not over it. even just typing this now, i feel raw.

then in march or so, i made a new fandom friend who knows you, and i enthusiastically recalled following you before and how much i enjoyed it. i didn't even know about stellina, and now there's kep too! but... i also didn't know you'd lost boone. i followed because i still really enjoy your blog, and i love your collies too. and butters!!! so glad she's still here!

idk what made me look tonight... maybe because i talked about my old border collie with someone today. i went looking for the posts immediately around when you lost boone, because i guess some part of me wanted to know what happened. i spent the better part of an hour (maybe longer?) reading posts from the weeks before the decline, and then the loss, and then the deluge of old boone pictures after, and i've been crying pretty much the whole time just reading your posts and tags about him.

and this is a long and windy way to get to saying thank you. i'm glad you shared your grief, though that seems like a weird thing to say. there's something cathartic about crying over someone else's dog when you still hurt about your own, and knowing you're not alone in that kind of sorrow. boone was such a beautiful boy. i'll never forget that silly post that made me check your blog out in the first place, or the years of posts i stuck around for after. i wish i'd remembered to follow sooner, but the archive is still there, and it's so fun looking through all those old posts about him and his quirks and antics. he was amazing.

sorry for the length of this, i just... really wanted you to know that he touched yet another life, i guess. and i've been so deeply enjoying your posts about stellina and kep. i know it'll be a year soon... i hope there's some peace in how things have gone since he passed, and i hope the anniversary isn't too hard on you. thank you for sharing him with us.

i've been on tumblr for 14 years and this is, genuinely, the nicest ask i think i've ever been sent.

thank you - sincerely. there's been a lot of times over the course of this blog that i've felt like i was oversharing, or talking about pointless things only i cared about. i still so frequently start typing out a post only to stop mid-sentence and delete it because i can't help but think "no one cares about this." possibly it's why i like to talk about my pets so much - they're not me, but i'm the one who knows them best, so i get to say "hey look at this" and ramble and have people say "i'm looking" back. when boone passed, i lost that filter and i poured my grief out into this blog because it was the closest outlet i had. and to have hundreds of people not only acknowledge this but to commiserate, to reassure, to share their own stories - that helped healed me more than i can put into words. it's exactly as you said: there's a catharsis in grieving together.

i am sorry you also had to say goodbye. i wish i could say it gets easier, but i think that would be defeating the point of grief. your grief is your love and damn it if there isn't any act more loving in the world than choosing to say goodbye to an old, loyal dog. you think of how dogs were domesticated tens of thousands of years ago, of how human society and dogs have developed intertwined, of how we have records of ancient greeks and romans carving loving epitaths on their dog's graves, of how a prehistoric dog's skull was found with a bone placed in it's mouth after death, and you wonder if grieving a dog isn't one of the most consistent experiences in the whole of human history that there is.

i'm glad to know that this could bring you some comfort, in some way. it's incredibly touching to know that you kept me and boone in your thoughts for all this time. i am doing ok - i've been reflecting a lot as we approach the one-year mark. i'm not sure if i'll be able to condense those thoughts down into coherent words, but i'll do my best. i hope that my silly little pets continue to bring you some happiness, and that you've found peace with your own grief.

thank you, again - this is extremely touching and means a hell of a lot to me.

#i know exactly what you mean about reading posts about other peoples loss and grieving in camaraderie with them. i do that too #also mayhaps i am nosy sometimes and want to intrude. i cant help my nature to be a looky-loo #which is to say: you should never feel like you are intruding for doing so back to me.

[kangals]

stanced up and borking at a neighbor dog on the sidewalk

#fluffy and ready to fight* #*(flee like little baby at first danger)

[kangals]

I absolutely love your fur babies! ❤️ would you mind art of them?

👀you are literally always welcome to draw any of my pets yesyes

[kangals]

Pets love to show up like Hello i am Mystery Wet :)

[kangals]

head too big for he gotdam body