Greg Brown in his ‘song’ Eugene says ‘a dog is bound to find me sooner or later. Sometimes you gotta not look too hard, just let the dog find you’.

My dog Stella is my constant companion. I’m asked all the time about her.

Here is her story, briefly.

It all began around Easter of 2014 when Valerie’s aunt came to visit. We were talking about dogs and possibly getting a dog but couldn’t really decide on what we wanted or if it was good timing. I expressed interest in an Australian Cattle Dog due to a variety of factors but mainly because of their tendency to be a great adventure dog. I love to go on walks. It helps me think and gets the blood flowing. I was doing a lot of walking around the neighborhood for exercise and mental health as I had been working form home for a while. People don’t think twice about a guy walking around with a dog but when he’s alone, that’s when it gets creepy. Previously we had a pair of beagles that were good walking buddies but not good fishing buddies. They both passed on a few years prior. It seemed like time to think about another dog. I didn’t consider myself to be a hard core dog person. I always thought hard core dog people were strange. A little off, even.

About a month later I get an email from Valerie’s aunt and she said that there’s a 2 year old Australian Cattle Dog that needs a home in her area of Dallas. The dog had an inconsistent series of owners that couldn’t really care for her as she needed so they were looking for a good home for her. Cattle dogs need a defined job. Something that exercises their mind as well as body. When left idle they get tend to be destructive and ill mannered. I decided to let it go and not worry about it as it didn’t seem like the right timing. A few days later I mentioned the email to Valerie. She seemed amenable. I called the guy and set up a meeting for when we’d be in Dallas a few weeks later for our family Texas Tour.
The time came to meet Stella and it went as well as could be expected. She appeared overweight and starved for attention but well behaved. We picked her up on our way back to St. Louis a week later. A painless and simple process. Most good things don’t happen this easy.

After the 13 hour ride home she seemed to be comfortable with us and the kids loved her as did I. Two days after that a friend was in town visiting family and we went smallmouth bass fishing so that’s when Stella’s first fishing trip was. She did great and was eager to know everything that was going on and follow along for the fun.

A month later I took her up to fish the Driftless area and she had a very close encounter with a herd of cows. They tried to play with her and it scared her pretty badly when they butt sniffed her.

Since then she’s been nearly everywhere with me. I’ve been offered a lot of money by many different people for her. She has made friends everywhere she has gone and at almost 8 years old (on June 5th) absolutely freaks out when she hears mention of one of her favorite things - fishing, frisbee, or walking. She’s pretty needy when it comes to me leaving her, even when my family is with her. She usually waits by the back door until I get home whether it’s the grocery store or a long trip that she can’t come along on.

I see our relationship as mutually beneficial - we are each other’s emotional support animal. She attaches herself to a few of my friends and looks out for everyone I care for. Like one time at a Catskill Rodmaker Gathering in Roscoe, NY with my friend and hero Tomo Ijuin. She would spend a lot of time with him to make sure he was doing ok but would run back over to me to make sure it was ok for her to be not with me.

She’s agile and strong, sweet and smart. Not too hyper but can get worked up over most anything. She sleeps hard and plays harder. I’ve seen her scale nearly sheer rock faces like it was no big deal and leap from rock to rock to see a 3 inch trout. Her herding instincts really come into play when a fish is caught. If she sees a bent rod, a rise to a fly or hears the usual ‘whoop’ of someone catching a fish there’s nothing that will hold her back from being right there. Occasionally nipping at the fish but hardly ever making contact. She’ll watch your fly drift across a fishy pool and when you don’t get a rise she’ll look at you like ‘why not?’ Every now and then she’ll walk ahead too soon and spook the fish but not normally.

She’s 40 pounds of muscle and love. When she hears the click of a fly reel she’ll run to the back door thinking it’s time to go out and cast some rods.

She’s sitting as close as possible to me right now as I write this, on the same chair as me. She lays behind me when I’m wrapping rods. She sits beside me when I’m working on the lathe. She sits behind me when I’m eating dinner. If I don’t know where she is, she’s likely in my shadow. Australian cattle dogs are also called velcro dogs because they have a person and stick to them at all times and at all costs. This can be a little irritating at times especially when I accidentally trip over her. Or when she get a little nippy with the fish and bumps it off the barbless hook. That’s okay. I wonder if those first two years of having inconsistent ownership made her extra needy for her companion.

I’ve never done any formal training with her, for better or worse. She came to me knowing her name, how to give me a high five and sit. She’s basically been trained by conversation and knows what I mean more by my tone of voice/grunt or a finger snap than anything.

I have gone on a bit long and could go on even longer. A good dog is worth it, but definitely not for sale.