Dixie, nine weeks

Dixie was the first ES we ever owned. We got her in the spring of 1998. She was about 8-10 weeks old when we got her and she was the cutest pup I have ever seen. She was so soft that my uncle teased about making slippers out of her!

She came from Arkansas (we lived in Oklahoma then) with my uncle, who delivered her to us. He arrived in the evening and Dan took her out and held her right away and they bonded pretty well. Being evening, I went to the kitchen to make supper. She promptly prissed herself in there are barked at me continually until I would in get in the same room as the rest of the herd!

I was unfamiliar with ES at the time and should have reprimanded her for being bossy to me, but in my ignorance, I did not. I chose to look at how smart she was to try to keep me with the herd. She became a real problem to me in particular. She refused to see me as authority.

As Dixie grew, everything got worse. She was VERY energetic. At the time, my husband was working for a corporate hog farm and the only animals we have at home were horses. We did not have enough to do to keep her occupied. (This should not be a problem for a true farmcollie!) She chased the cats, she chased the cars, she chased the horses. She jumped on people. She was so incredibly quick that the horse couldn’t kick her and I certainly could not give her the “knee” to get her off of me. The neighbors clocked her at 45 mph when she would chase them.

We would tie her up as punishment for the chasing crimes. She got to where when she would hear a car coming, she would start toward the road, stop and consider her punishment, chase the car, then go lay at the end of her rope! She did the same thing for chasing cats. She knew it was wrong and she knew she would be punished and she did it anyway.

We tried training her only with reward and praise. Then she would only behave if you had a treat in your hand! It became more of a bribe than a reward.

She would constantly dig in the flowerbeds. I always believed that a dog digs in predominantly to keep cool, so I always give them a cool spot to lay and keep it damp. Dixie, however, would not pick one spot. She would dig somewhere new everyday. I would go out and holler at her and she would get out for about 3 minutes. Then she would go back. I put rocks in between the plants to discourage her—big 5 pound rocks. She would either move them or lay on top of them! This is when it became evident to Mom that Dixie was occupying herself by just pissing me off!

I tried being physical with her to get her to respect me (like an alpha female would in a pack). I had to quit that when it became evident that she was going to bite me and that would not do either of us any good. She never did bite hard, but she absolutely would have had we continued. She could not stand authority.

She could be extremely sweet and affectionate as long as I was behaving like she thought I should. She loved water. She would get in her mud puddle I would make her and bury herself down to where only her eyes and nostrils were sticking out—just like a hippo.

She also would stand inside the backyard fence and bark incessantly for hours, no matter what you did to stop her.

When she got her first heat, she developed a uterine infection, which caused us to spay her immediately. She did not respond well to the surgery or normal antibiotics and she kept a high fever for a couple of days afterward. The vet determined she had some kind of autoimmune disorder and he suspected lupus.

She was hit by a car when she was just 2. Dan was sad, but I was relieved that she would not be around as our kids got old enough to try to boss her.

She was a beautiful dog.