A Farmer’s Wife Best Friend, Meet my Trixie

On a sunny June day in 2022 a litter of 9 huntaway pups were born and straight away we took to each other, and we have been best friends since!

A wee bit about Trix and her sister’s

Born to Karl’s main working dog Fern, they were a rambunctious bunch from day dot. Gracie (Karl’s oldest daughter) and I convinced him that a litter of pups from his aging mainstay dog was a good idea. We promised we would take care of them and do all the work so when the time came and Fern would take her well-earned retirement, he would have a replacement huntaway dog.

So, we bred her to a beautiful huge huntaway and roughly 58 days later they were born!

Like most animals on the farm, when they are babies, they are VERY CUTE! Needless to say, he was probably slightly worried (though he never mentioned it) that one pup might turn into more.

If you have ever been around a litter of 9 puppies you will know they can get up to a lot of mischief, they can also eat you out of house and home. Gracie and I had set up a good puppy play pen lined with soft hay for them to sleep in along with an old horse cover. They would of course come out for multiple times a day for runs and play time.

Well one of the pups kept getting out no matter what we did! She was a little nuisance and was aptly named her Ratty. Karl took to her personality straight away. He said, “I like that pup” and “she is always the first to get out and loves to hang around us”. So, she became Karls’s choice of pup. Here you can see a photo of the front porch, with puppies amongst the sea of gumboots.

Gracie on the other hand started to love a pup she named Blondie; she liked her because she had very blonde, tan colouring like her mum. I could see she was getting attached to her and I had a talk to Karl about her keeping Blondie to herself as a good pup for her to train up. I think he also could see that his daughter fell in love with her as well. So of course he agreed. What a great man he is.

Here is a picture of Ratty and Blondie. They were older in this photo and had started to go to work to learn all the sights and sounds on the farm. They also had to learn how to ride on the back on a motorbike. Blondie is on the left and Ratty the right. You can see they both have totally different tan markings. They are full sister’s to Trix who again has much darker tan markings than her sisters.

How did I manage to keep Trix?

My poor husband! so now he had two new pups for the farm, and little did he know there was going to be a THIRD hahaha. Bless my husband, he truly is the love of my life and has the kindest nature!

Once the puppies were old enough, they would start to see that there was more to this place than just the back lawn and dog kennel paddock. They were a curious bunch and had noted there was stock in the paddocks close to home.

I would wander down twice a day to feed chickens and piggies, so of course it was a great time for all the pups to come for a run. This does one of four things

• teaches them to come back when called
• shows them the different surroundings other than home
• introduces them to other animals like pigs and chickens (especially chickens so they don’t grow up to be chicken killers)
• and of course it’s great exercise

On more than one occasion they would take off for a run in the woolshed paddock, which had pet sheep in it. The basic instinct from an early age that they were to chase and bark. All those white balls of wool on legs, eating in the green lush paddocks was just too much for their playfulness. Without a doubt Trix and Blondie were always the instigators and the lead pups of mischief!

So much so that Trix (who at this point didn’t have a name) got what is called a broken bark. This happens when huntaway dogs bark too much when they are young. Instead of a nice deep bark which is the most optimal, she had a squeaky high-pitched bark. Even though I had been brought up on a farm I didn’t know anything about broken barks. Karl mentioned to me the pup was now pretty much useless to a farmer. She was not going to be easy to sell. In fact, some would say that as a working dog she would not be of any use and by some farmers they would be required to be put down. I FELT horrible!

During our walks down to the woolshed, I had started to notice that this pup would follow me everywhere. If i sat down, she would stop playing with her siblings and cuddle up to me. I hadn’t given her a name even though I fell in love with her. I did not want to get my hopes up and tried my hardest to be practical and know that one more was not going to happen.

One day while sitting on the deck, the puppies were playing together on the back lawn. I was sitting on the deck, hands on my face crying in unbelievable pain. If you don’t know I have a condition called Trigeminal Neuralgia and it is known as the most painful condition to mankind. I was in a lot of pain and unfortunately the more you cry in pain the more it hurts.

I have found over the years that keeping stress to a minimum and keeping my facial muscles soft, rather than tensed, provide me with me relief and help the attacks quieten down. Trix came over and sat next to me and cuddled up to me. She didn’t like to see me in this much distress and hadn’t seen it before either.

The next thing that happened amazed me more than I could ever convey. Trix started to sniff at the actual pain points in my face. She was able to pinpoint where the pain was coming from! I couldn’t believe it, she also wanted to lick my tears away. I had to stop her doing so as its gross but also it would create more pain.

Here was this young, playful pup who had now become my support pup. I told Karl about what had happened after a while, as she would often come over and do it. Even if I wasn’t showing pain by crying, she could still sense I was in pain.

How was I going to keep her

My husband knew Trix had now become a support dog to me and no doubt he could see the immense bond we shared. One day I asked if we could keep her on. She still had a broken bark and so I said could she become my companion dog, and I would take care of her as my own. Of course, being the wonderful husband that he is, he agreed.

Now just over two years later, her bark has got much better. Trix features in almost all my outside and garden videos as she loves to be by my side. She is not trained to move sheep or cattle. She really wants to and will sometimes run down to the woolshed when she hears the other working dogs barking.

I have taught her some basic commands like to speak (bark) and chase those darn baby piggies away from my garden! She loves it and it makes her feel good about herself too.

She loves to come for car rides, and I take her with me when I go away. The looks I get with a huge farm dog on my back seat looking at everything going on. Trix is a very large Huntaway, a lot bigger than her two sisters and her mother. I love to take her out and she knows whenever I put her special car blanket down its time for an adventure!

She will be a Farmer’s Wife best friend for hopefully a long time. I am very grateful Trix chose me to be her mum. Her comfort during my pain is the next best thing to a long healing hug from my husband.