Meet Missy!

Missy is here! She arrived via transport Saturday afternoon. My cousin was wonderful enough to meet the transport in Tomah at one of their scheduled stops (the rest of the dogs were continuing on to Minneapolis) to retrieve Missy while I was working at the shelter. Bethany then had the terrible inconvenience of watching the puppy for a few more hours until I got home. ;o) I wasn't sure I was actually going to get to bring her home with me!

I was fully intending to call her something other than Missy. No offense to anyone who has that name or has a fondness for it, but it is probably on my top 10 list for most undesirable dog names. lol I was waffling between Nell & Nessa for this little redhead -- and I actually did start calling her Nessa at first. Ultimately, though, I decided it would just be too darn confusing in the long run. She will be Missy on the web site. All of her paperwork will be in the name Missy. Any potential adopters would be e-mailing for information on Missy. So yes, in the long run it is far easier to just call her Missy, no matter how much I don't happen to like the name. Surely she will not be with us a terribly long time and her new owner can choose whichever name they like! :o)


Missy is fitting in with my crew remarkably well. When Joe arrived, Secret took to him more or less right away. Luke ignored him. Kaiser tried to attack him any time he played or tried to have any fun. Totally not so with Missy. I have no idea how to explain it, but he adores her. It can't be as simple as male vs. female, either, because Kaiser was just horrid to Lexie for the longest time. Whatever the reason, they are terribly cute together. They are almost the same size at the moment (Kaiser is 17 lbs, Missy is 16 lbs), so it is a good fit.

Secret has tried to play with the puppy a few times but I think Missy finds her a little overwhelming at the moment. They will play bow a bit, but then Missy backs off and doesn't act like she wants to play with Secret anymore. Of course, this could be because Secret snapped at her the first night and sliced a small spot right above her nose (which caused a super fun episode of sneezing, which sent blood spatters everywhere -- so fun to clean!). Secret was trying to keep Missy from following me into the bedroom and I let her know in no uncertain terms that this is not for her to decide. She has done a few lip curls at the puppy around toys, but it hasn't gone any further than that.

Missy is a terribly uncoordinated puppy. All I know of her history is that she was found wandering alongside a road. Her vet paperwork has a guestimated birthday of 11/22/11, which puts her right around 12 weeks. She has pretty much no muscle to speak of, so she looks a bit wobbly when she runs sometimes. She is working it out quickly, though, and I've already noticed an improvement in her gait. I'm the sort of overly anal person that would completely have a meltdown if this was a puppy I'd bought as a performance prospect, but since she's a foster the rational side of me is kicking in and knows this is just an awkward puppy stage.


Missy seems like a pretty bright little thing. Sit comes quite naturally to her and she offers it when presented with a treat. We haven't had a chance to work on anything else yet, but imagine my surprise when I was fixing up dinner dishes yesterday and she popped into a perfect, "Sit Pretty" all on her own. The only other dog I've ever known to do that completely unprovoked was my family's Scottish Terrier years and years ago.

She does very well in a crate, which is always nice! She rides nicely in the car, goes right into the crate in the living room to eat her meals and deals with bed time without any fuss. We've gotten up once each night so far, but that's just because I wake up and figure it wouldn't hurt to take her out (ie: she's not waking up and asking to go out). She seems to have done quite well while I was working yesterday, although thanks to Bethany & my parents she only had to go three hours between potty breaks. I wasn't sure how fair it would be to have her go 5 hours, so that worked out quite well.

The only real negatives I've spotted so far would be a total lack of bite inhibition (ouch!!) and the fact that she is pretty intense with her food. We are working on both of these things!

Missy isn't on the Border Collie Rescue of MN web site yet -- and likely won't be until I manage to get video and pictures put together -- but if you or anyone you know might be interested in adopting this little ginger dog, be sure to drop them a line! :o) I haven't gotten a chance to really evaluate her just yet, but early inklings say that she is going to be everything you would expect from a red girl. lol

I leave you with video from Missy's first walk today! It was pretty entertaining, I wish I could have captured some of the funnier bits.