How do I describe Otterpop? She's very, very special. If by special, you mean evil. Someone out on Larkin Valley road captured her one day, she was chasing cars on the road for a couple days with a border collie. This that and the other, someone thought it was my dog and I ended up taking her out to work with me. She looked like a weird, runty version of Ruby. Ruby is elegant, Otterpop is sort of bizarre and wrong like. She is put together from chihuahua and cattle dog parts, we call her a Watsonville street chihauhua. She was probably about 6 months old when I found her.

She loves the frisbee. She loves the ball. She loves the stick. She loves to chase and then posess these things. She wants to be the center of the universe. She used to want to chase cars more than anything, that is pretty much gone unless the car is named the UPS truck. She herds things. She likes to help at the ranch.

Stuff gets up her craw. People. Dogs. Agility Judges. She used to have a hair trigger, now we can keep the freakout meltdowns under control thanks to the magic of the dog training. Otterpop is probably about 11 years old now. Otterpop achieved things in agility I would have never dreamed of for a stumpy dog from the side of the road. She's competed in Regionals and Cynosports, and made regular appearances in the USDAA Top Ten, including the Number One spot her final year of trialing.

There are still bugs in the system. She works on being good every day of her life. She has a large arsenal of cute circus tricks. Don't tell the other dogs, but this one is crazy smart, as long as I can keep channeling that smartnedss for the powers of good not evil, we are ok. If she ever learns to use weaponry or write manifestos, we are all in really big trouble.

Otterpop can do anything and she can do everything. There could never, ever be another Otterpop.

photo by the amazing Diane Morey