Tess

Yesterday was Tess’s third birthday, so I figured I’d better put up some stuff about her like I did for Gyvie.

I remember Mummy ringing the owners from a phone box on the side of the road at one point. How excited Jessica was when we found out they still had two female puppies left! We arrived in Rockhampton in the afternoon a few days later, and the owner walked down the long driveway to meet us. (It was a good thing, because we would never have got up there with the bus!) He was carrying two puppies. One was black with a spotted, lopsided, white blaze and spotty white toes. The other had full spotty white legs. Jessica held them both separately and although I was keen on the white legged pup, Jessica decided to take the other one. Sparkie didn’t know what to think when we brought the puppy inside!

After a bit of suggesting, we decided on “Tess.” She had a few aggression issues to work on – such as, if we touched her back she’d try to bite us. It was a bit disconcerting seeing such aggressive behaviour from a nine week old puppy! And after we broke her of that, we had to work on food aggression. After a few months of training, Tess finally settled down, only to start getting territorial over Jessica’s bed. She’d growl and snap whenever someone touched the bed. By the time she was nearly two, she was doing it to other little kids who came in to pat her. She also had dominance issues – she’d attack other dogs if they showed any dominance towards her. This led to her snarling viciously at the other competing dogs at the Gympie Show in 2010. When we got Lassie in July that same year, Tess was so aggressive we were afraid she was seriously injure little Lassie!

Nowadays, Tess still gets in the occasional fight with one of the other dogs, often Sparkie or Sambo then Lassie tries to join in. She still growls at new dogs but the actual attacks are getting less. She doesn’t get territorial over the bed anymore.

Despite her aggression problems, Tess managed to get a first place in Best Medium Dog at the Gympie Show in 2010. She also placed first in Best Tricks and second in Agility in 2011. She knows about thirty tricks – including jumping into Jessica’s arms, lifting her back leg, putting a toy in a bucket, pulling a towel off the handrail, and jumping through a rolling hoop. She loves to play disc, flyball, and agility, work cattle and goats, chase rabbits, and eat. Once we found her INSIDE a rubbish bin snacking on somebody else’s garbage!