a special request

This is how Stumpy looks when she just wakes up... a good thing for one dog to know, in case he is pondering the future...



This is Stumpy, giving me her "look," when she has waited quite long enough.



"OK, I'm sitting, I have been sitting and your point is?"


Stumpy goes to get the ball, and has several other stops to make before she can return. Oops, she will have to go back and get the ball. Her priorities and my priorities are quite different, frequently... Pretty soon, I will be out of balls and have to do a recon mission. The yard is full of balls, but she will only bring one back if it has just been thrown. If she is in the mood.


Note the attractive black band at the beginning of her tail. According to some, that is a genetic trait that ties her to "Hall's Heelers." Thomas Hall is said, by some, to have bred the original Australian cattle dogs. The ancestry of the "heeler" is argued to this day, Down Under. Stumpy, being one of the rare, sooooo highly valued blue dogs, if legend is to be believed, also has some blue blood.

Stumpy was found with her litter mates, all stumpy tailed cattle dogs. By the time she came into my life, we could not find any of her litter mates :( We named her Jibesek, which in Potawatomi, means rotten little stump.

Once Stumpy woke up from her nightmare of a life and came out of her shell she turned into rotten little holy terror of a dog (Jezebel and DeeDee for devil dog were the other choices.) She is called Stumpy in honor of her littermates. We hope and pray they are safe and happy.

Another little known fact...Cattle dogs should only have stump tails if born that way. Of course, here in the good ol' USA we have to improve upon the breed, and that includes chopping off some poor puppies tails.


The End.