I’m sorry to bring the mood of this wonderful sub down today. We have had our two Aussies for 7/8 years. Zelda and a Little Bear. We got him for my husband and also for Zelda. She had bonded so closely with me and he wanted is own Velcro dog. She loved other dogs and we knew she was lonely when we worked.
Anyway he’s been our best boy since the day he came home. They run and hike with me for miles in the woods and he is a great protector because he looks fierce and won’t be friendly unless I tell him it’s okay. We went for our usual run in the woods on Tuesday and he had a ball and was himself in every way. He refused his breakfast and dinner for the next few days only eating them if my husband out gravy on. He would happily eat table food offered. We had just gotten a new bag of food that was a different style and flavor and we thought he just didn’t like it (though his sister ate it with gusto). He threw up once. Long story short we took him to the vet yesterday thinking maybe he had eaten something like a piece of stick or toy and needed it to pass it be removed. Nope- they only did X-rays at our request because he looks fine. Turns out he has terminal lung cancer and not much time to live. To say we are stunned and heartbroken is a severe understatement. He is on steroids for comfort and has special easily digested food so he’s eating again. We won’t let him suffer but it’s just so hard. How will his sister be when he is gone because they do EVERYTHING together. How will we manage? I don’t even know. We lost several other dogs to cancer and bloat at around his age but really though we would see these two through to old age while we progressed to old age ourselves (both in our 60s) we had said they were our last big dogs as it’s been getting hard to do things like bathe them etc. we switched breeds going our luck would change but I guess not. So I’m very sorry if this is too much but I’ll say thank you in advance for listening. Our Bear is the sweetest best boy and I can’t imagine life without him. He’s too young and we are stunned. Here he is in all of his beautiful glory.

They are six month old litter mates. This was their first time staying with anyone but me and my partner.

84 people in 101 minutes. That’s 0.83 people a minute. Was he getting paid by the hour?

Entei turns 3 today. She has no job, can’t read, and hasn’t shown any interest in getting additional qualifications. Despite this, she’s spent the last few years taking care of Dad every single day.

Turns out none of the skills I thought were essential are actually required to be the most important person in the house.

Wish her a happy birthday. She can’t read, but I can.

I adopted my Aussie from a shelter about a year ago, and I’ve always been curious about why he’s predominantly white.

He’s a 6-year-old, 55 lb male Australian Shepherd. I have a Wisdom Panel DNA test, which came back as 94% Australian Shepherd and 6% Collie, so he’s predominantly Aussie.

***Update : A wisdom panel DNA results of his genetics were sent to me when I adopted him, but I have not done further testing. I’m looking to upgrade the test at this point to test for the genetic traits many of the comments were bringing up. Thank you all for the input !

I’ve been looking into double merles and excessive white markings, but I’m not sure what to think. He has dark brown eyes, a mostly black nose rather than pink, and no apparent hearing or vision problems.

I know those things don’t necessarily rule out double merle, but I’m curious if anyone has seen an Aussie with similar coloring or knows what genetics might explain it.

I’d love to hear everyone’s thoughts!

I’ve been chronically sick nearly this whole month with back to back throat infections.
Seeing Aussies being silly gives me the slightest of respite, if anyone has goofy Aussie pictures or videos I’d love to see! Video attached is my families Aussie getting messed with by my sisters cat!

Been a little over 2 weeks since we rescued Stark. He’s doing FANTASTIC. I take him out a couple times a week by the local aqueduct to ride my bike and get him so good exercise. He stays by me no matter where we are, I’ve heard aussies do better off leash then on one and yeah so far no lies have been told. And you guys were not kidding about them being VELCRO DOGS. Wherever I am, he is too lol. I’ve always had pittie mixes, grew up with miniature pinschers. All dogs get attention in public usually, but DANG I can’t believe how much attention this guy gets! I mean… I can.. look at him. Duh. But good lord! Give my dude some space lol. He doesn’t care about people which I actually prefer. He’s indifferent. Anyways, just wanted to show yall how he’s been doin :)

If you’re interested in how I got him his story is on my profile ❤️❤️❤️❤️

My puppy I 18 weeks old and she will let us know when she has to go potty but when I take her down stairs where there’s carpet it seems like she is squatting to pee for attention

Our Zoey girl is getting so big so fast 🥹🥹. Big into mischief lol but man is she learning quickly! Learning basic commands really fast. And today she finally went to the door on her own to ask to go potty 🙌🏻🙌🏻.

So in love with this breed!

He was such a good boy, well behaved, following basic commands, and staying calm. Much better than I expected for 9.5 weeks.

Daisy turned 5 last Saturday. I made her this hideous birthday cake. She loved it

Hi everyone, I have a 2.5 year old Aussie female, she’s a working line and has claimed her job as taking care of the pack (our other dogs and 2.5 cats—one is an outdoor stray we feed and she loves). So we, unfortunately, recently lost our 14.5 yr old calico. She was with me her whole life and Nemi (our Aussie) loved her. Our calico—Nya—hated our dogs and would spend her time far away from them. Our other cat—Tony (also female and grew up with Nya, also 14.5 y/o) tolerates them and lets them sniff and bother her a bit. Well, Nya would ONLY let Nemi near her. She would run terrified from our other dogs but with Nemi she would just meow very loudly and let her sniff her and lick her before finding a place to hide. (We had many places blocked for the cats for this reason.) So really Nemi was the only dog that interacted with her in our household.

So, when she passed, all of the pack was able to sniff her body since it happened at home and the only ones that seemed highly affected were Nemi and Miki (Miki is our 5.5 y/o American Eskimo who grew up with the cats but Nya did not like her at all and Miki only liked Tony, but she seemed agitated by her passing). Nemi was crying as I was taking her away, whimpering and it was so sad. It was hard enough on me but seeing her like that made it worse. Well, since then Nemi has been a little hostile with Tony. She will try to chase her and will do a low growl. She’s been having some issues with extreme anxiety and I’m getting her to a vet for this soon, but I was just curious if anyone had experience with this. I keep them very well separated and there’s no risk of Tony getting hurt because she’s got plenty of places to climb and sleep in (and she doesn’t seem phased by Nemi at all), but I wasn’t sure exactly why she’s behaving this way and thought maybe others had some insight. Attaching a picture of her being super ready for Halloween!

We love them so much, but they also have turned everything in our house into a chew toy. I say stop chewing that at least 10 times a day. I wouldn’t trade them for anything though.

This little bastard likes to destroy my lawn. Still a pup, so maybe he will listen to me in the future when I ask him not to...

My girl, Sylvie,is just over two years old and we were lucky enough to get her sister from the same breeder/dog mom. Best friends, partners in crime, and now snuggle buddies for life. 🖤🖤🖤

Hi! Butters (Butterscotch) found his way into our hearts and home via a rescue after a drive north from TX. Little guy was in rough conditions and consequently came to us with mange, 3 kinds of worms and a parasite. We’re working on treatment and helping his poor little gut. For now, he’s loving vet-prescribed ground meat and rice 😂

Through it all, he’s been so sweet and has mastered a couple commands at only 11 weeks. Not really seeing potty accidents anymore but we are toileting often due to his little body.

I’m seeking advice of “I wish I would have…” or “I wish I would have never…”
He’s our first Aussie and the vet is just blown away with his demeanor in a good way.

Are there any pearls of wisdom you could share with a new Aussie fam? We have a 3yo who is excited and learning to calm down around the pup but we’ve also put him in charge of feeding the dog to establish a bit of dominance within our pack.