You might also be interested in his Picture Gallery.
The 3 month-old Border Collie puppy was going wild in his tiny cage in the chain pet store. Hubby and I had gone in there to get some crickets for my daughter's pet tarantula when we heard a commotion at the puppy cages end of the store. We don't like visiting that part of the store. One, because I love puppies and am always tempted to take them ALL home, and two, because we don't believe in supporting the puppy mill industry. But the noise coming from one cage drew our attention, so we went to see what could possibly be happening over there. Imagine our suprise at seeing a Border Collie, of all the inappropriate dogs to have in a small cage, literally bouncing off the walls!
Being Border Collie people, of course we had to get that little guy out of the cage and into the puppy exercise room so he could burn some energy. We weren't thinking of buying this puppy. Rex doesn't like male dogs, for one thing, and there was that puppy mill issue to take into consideration. The puppy, however, must have had other plans.... He went about it in an odd way, though. Instead of putting all his considerable charm and beauty to work to win our hearts, he spent 30 minutes or so with us in that puppy room bouncing off the walls, jumping on us, chewing Adam's shoelaces and burrowing into my dress. Not once, not even ONE time, did he slow down and take a break. The pup was absolutely manic. I thought, "He's either a nut case, or living in a small cage for a month has truly traumatized him".
Well, long story short, we ended up talking with the store employees. Apparently the pup was one of two brought in from a well-known college town about 100 miles south of us in this same state. As this state isn't known to be a puppy mill haven, we hoped we wouldn't be supporting such a horrible industry by rescuing this cage-crazed puppy from an environment he found intolerable. So we went home and brought Rex back to meet the puppy. Things went fine. We talked the store manager into knocking $150 off the puppy's "bail" (I'm sure that they were desperate to find a home for this Wild Thing by now!), and we arranged for him to be bathed before we took him home. In the mean time, we purchased a dog crate and some puppy supplies so that he'd have his own space and things when we got him home.
The ride home was eventful. Puppy squirmed in my lap, yipped and scratched to be put down during the whole journey to our house. He wouldn't stay still for a moment! When we got home and put him down, same thing. He didn't stop his desperate running and jumping until he literally wore himself out and dropped off to sleep in the middle of chewing on a dog toy, as puppies his age are wont to do. That night, after watching him go nuts for hours, and finally getting him settled in his new crate, we thought about whether he had told us his name, yet. We couldn't think of what it would be, so we went online. We searched for names that would bring to mind his over-the-top mischievous, devilish temperment. When we found "Puck" among the list, it practically screamed "THIS IS ME!!!!!" at us. After some research on "that shrewd and knavish sprite" (an interesting history of the original can be found here ), we found that other names for him included "Robin Goodfellow", and so Puppy got his full and most appropriate name: Puck Robin Dogfellow. What could be better for such a wild and crazy little guy? Puck lives up to his name every waking moment. He could probably give his namesake lessons!
Not much about Puck's personality has changed in the past year. Is his breeding suspect because of his almost unknown background? Perhaps. Is he just a normal, hyper border collie? From my experience, pretty much. I love him so much that it just doesn't matter. In my eyes, he's perfect. This despite what my friend and Puck's Flyball coach, Laura Wilson of the X-Fidos, calls him. "Trouble", she says! See me blowing a raspberry at you, Laura? *grins*.
Nowadays, Puck loves to do any number of things. More than anything, he loves sheepherding lessons. Food comes a close second. He enjoys his Flyball lessons, although he's not one of those ball-obsessed border collies. He's more into it for the social aspects, from what I can tell :-). He learned his basic obedience commands quickly, and shows us what tricks he thinks we should know. That's how we learned that he loves to "gimme five" and beg for snackies or attention, among other things. He was crate and housetrained very quickly. Although he's an alpha male, like Rex, and they now have to be kept separated, Puck still loves to play with other dogs. He loves riding in the Jeep (the '64 1/2 Mustang is off limits!), playing in dog parks and going to the beach. Like all of our dogs, disembowling and dismembering old "stuffies" is right up there on his list of good things, too. Tug-of-War is his favorite game at home, and he would play it all through the day and night if he could only get us to "take this toy NOW!" every time he shoves the rubber rings, a rope, a ball, or a pair of stolen socks at us.
Puck's dislikes include boiled chicken livers; delivery vans; postal service vehicles; bicyclists; my cat, Pippin; and most of all, school busses. Poor Puck quickly learned to jump over our perimeter fence, and one day when my 15 year-old son was supposedly watching him to prevent such an occurance, Puck jumped over the fence and right in front of a school bus! Although Puck was extraordinarily lucky, and was only bruised by the encounter, he came away from the experience with a total terror of school busses. The local mass transit busses that pass by our house every 10 minutes don't bother him, but let him see or even hear a school bus, whether its near or far, and he dives for the nearest hiding place. Outside, that's usually under an overhang near the front porch. Inside, that would be straight to the computer/art room and under my desk. No windows under there, so far from the road, so he can't see the Evil School Busses, and what's more important, they can't see him!! If we're walking him on a leash somewhere and a school bus comes into sight, he freaks out, barking hysterically and trying to hide. He even knows approximately what hours they run, and he listens and looks for them constantly. He's especially stressed when Robert leaves for school or comes home. Puck won't go outside for a couple of hours after either of those occurances. Nothing can convince him that it's safe out there during those times. You know what, though? He hasn't jumped over the perimeter fence, since! We're waiting to see if Summer Vacation, with its almost total lack of school busses, lessens his fear. I doubt it, though. BCs never seem to forget anything....
So that's Puck's story. He has grown into a fine, beautiful dog who loves me more than anything or anyone on earth (although he is beside himself with joy when we have guests over, and he thinks Adam and Rob are MOST excellent chew toys!), and he can (almost) always be counted on to obey me when he wouldn't even listen to anyone else. For all his hyper, stubborn and sometimes defiant ways, Puck is a loving, trusting dog with a heart of gold. This "shrewd and knavish sprite" has become the canine light and love of my life.
You can visit his photo gallery.
Home