A New Kind of Sheepdog

I'd like you to meet our sheepdog, Brinkley. Brinkley has lived with us for 2 years now. Her history B.U. (before us) is unknown--except that a kind woman rescued her from a shelter and allowed us to adopt her. We also know that she had a litter of pups.

Brinkley is rather timid, for a sheepdog. She is half border collie (good sheepdog material) and probably half australian shepherd (also good sheepdog material). Of course we don't know if she'd ever seen a sheep before she made it to Shady Side Farm--our guess is no.

This past winter we had a lamb that was so weak when she was born she couldn't even stand up. We took her into the house to warm her up on a heating pad. Brinkley decided that this little baby needed mothering. We didn't get a photo of her licking the lamb, but this one's almost as good.

This lamb was a very tough case. No sucking reflex for about two weeks. We really had to fight to keep her alive. Now she runs "lamb races" with the best of them.

I suppose if we change the definition of "sheepdog", the term might fit our dog Brinkley...

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