[Originally posted to blogoSFERICS]

Well, we’ve picked up another stray, and this one appears to really be a stray. In the photos she looks a lot better than she did when she followed one of my wife’s co-workers (see comment) home a few days ago—she’s been bathed and exercised since. The red collar she’s wearing is all there is, no tag, no tattoos, no distinguishing characteristics.

I’m estimating her age at four or five years; she has no gray at the muzzle yet but her collar, though loose about her neck, has been on its current setting quite some time. We figure she’s been wandering loose for some time but she was quite happy to hang around at my wife’s co-worker’s house before we came and picked her up. Part of that, though, may be because we were having something of a heat wave until yesterday, and we’ve noticed she really doesn’t like to be out in the heat.

She’s got some very minor problem behaviors, the nature of which lead me to believe she may not have been an only dog at her former home. She likes to jump up on people but we’re working on breaking her of that. She will often respond to a whistle but when she gets far enough away only a loud, stern yell will bring her back. Out of habit I yell “Dog!“ but it’s possible any word will do, including a name. We’ve taken to calling her Lucy.

She appears to be at least half border collie, and someone suggested to my wife yesterday there might also be some lab blood. Despite the picture at left, her ears really look more border-collie-like than lab-like.

My wife’s co-worker says he and his family asked around in the neighborhood where they found her to find out if anyone knew where she belongs, but had no luck. Yet unless she’s just a stocky dog she seems to be a little overweight, which wouldn’t suggest she’d been on her own for all that long. Yet she at least hadn’t been bathed in quite a while and I suspect her previous family either didn’t have much time for her or simply didn’t know how to discourage unwanted behaviors and teach such basic things as sit and stay. We hope she’s not too old to learn.

And yes, that does mean we expect to keep her.