Less than a year after we said farewell to Ben our first dog we decided it was time to have another.
We decided to see if we could find a dog that had ended up in the Birmingham Dog Home that we could offer a new life.
I can remember to this day walking round looking at all the dogs most of which were up against their pen gates barking and bouncing around and coming across one pen where, huddled right at the back looking very frightened and timid was this black and golden puff ball!
I knelt down and offered my hand gently towards the bars and began trying to coax the dog to me. Slowly and nervously he began to approach and I think straight away both my wife and I knew that this was the one we wanted.
Bracken had just prior to our arrival been washed and by the look of it had been given a blow dry – he really was having a big hair day!
We think Bracken was a 1st cross Rough Collie and German Shepherd
Fantastic looks – big, strong looking, fine face with deep eyes and a gorgeous fur colouring – a mixture of the blacks of the German Shepherd and the golds and browns of the Rough Collie.
His build was a nice blend. Some of the sturdy solidness of the German Shepherd and the finer longer bones of the Rough Collie.
We had to wait 7 days before we were able to collect Ben to make sure that his original owners didn’t turn up to collect him and that he was physically OK.
Bracken Becomes Part Of Our Family
When the day came to get Bracken the kids were excited and so were we. We got him home and gently introduced him to his new family and surroundings.
It wasn’t long however before we realised we had work to do with him!
We don’t know if it was his previous owners handling of him (certainly a lack of training!) or unlikely but I suppose possible, something in his heritage of cross Rough Collie and German Shepherd but Bracken was a somewhat out of control nut case in the beginning.
We’ll cover the stories around Bracken and his exploits in separate posts but we understood pretty quickly how he had ended up in the Birmingham Dogs Home.
Eventually we got Bracken trained and calmed down a bit. He turned in to a really lovely dog that gave us an immense amount of pleasure over the years he was with us.
Eventually as it always does age caught up with Bracken and as is common in German Shepherds his back legs gave out on him. He was probably suffering from degenerative myelopathy which is a non treatable, progressive, degenerative disease of the spinal cord.
We eventually had to say farewell to Bracken – yet another heartbreaking moment for us.
Bracken was a part of our family and life for nearly 12 years. Being a rescue dog we can’t be sure of his age we suspect when we finally said farewell to him he would have been about 13 or 14 at most.
A handful to begin with but through his antics and loving gentle nature very quickly a much loved part of our family.
This Post Has 5 Comments
Our shepherd-collie also brought us, as you say, immense pleasure (for 16 years). I daresay we brought the same to her. She went ‘on pension’ at age 14; we moved to the country for 2 years to keep her comfortable. Thank you for your beautiful color picture.
Hi Kevin – it would great to see pictures of your shepherd-collie if you had any you would like to share.
Regrets Mike, no pictures. That’s why I was so thrilled to see Bracken’s color photo; Heidi and Bracken look like a match in coloring, temperament, and intelligence! Again, thank you for posting about Bracken.
PS Heidi was born on a cattle farm. When we got her, her Dog Mother (a full shepherd) had already taught her not to foul her own nest..
Such a shame you have no pictures of Heidi.
We had Bracken at the time when mobile phones and digital cameras were just getting started so we only had a few digital pictures of him when compared to our dogs that followed him and we haven’t been able to find the ones of him taken on 35mm film.
I know it wouldn’t be the same as having one of Heidi but if you want one of our pictures as a reminder of what clearly was an important dog to you let me know.
Lovely recollections and reporting here!!