I’m almost through the A breeds, there’s three left, I can sense, progress.
I’ve missed three days so far in these first 20. I try and not skip too often but my main goal really is to also not burn myself out and get through them all.
Piece for a research project! I'll be illustrating a series of herding dog behaviours for this paper. Since it's due in May, I'll be uploading them as I complete them! B&W for ease of printing (also scans better in Starbucks lighting lol)
I've been lurking in the community for a little while, and wanted to introduce my baby girl, Nita. (Named in large part after Nita from @dianeduane's So You Want To Be A Wizard series.)
She's a Texas Heeler (Australian Shepherd x Australian Cattle Dog mix), currently 9 months old, and an absolute delight. We're hoping to get her into agility training and maybe competition once she's old enough, because she is made of springs (her most impressive achievement so far was somehow jumping a baby gate at 12 weeks, forcing us to promptly find a taller one) and as a herding mix we know having some kind of job would be good for her.
She's a lot of "firsts" for me and my husband - first dog owned by us (not our parents), first puppy, and first herding breed, so it's been quite the learning curve. I decided to go back to school this past fall to finish my comp sci degree, and my first semester really felt like I was double majoring, but the second major was just "dog."
This also means that I am very much learning as I go when it comes to stuff like training and dog sports, so I welcome any recommendations on books/articles/other ideas for improvement. We went through a positive reinforcement focused basic manners class with her from around 4-5 months old, and we got very lucky with her; so far she's been a very good puppy, even as a teenager. Definitely not perfect, but I'm pretty sure by the standard of "teenage cattle dog mix" she's an absolute angel.
This photo is her at just under 6 months, as it's the best one I have of her so far. That one floppy ear has since perked up the rest of the way! I'm by no means a professional photographer, and she's not really one to stand still for pics, lol. The banner pic is her (on the left) at the dog park the other day with her brother (on the right with the odd eyes, owned by a friend).
I hope that you all love her even a fraction as much as I do :)