In Memory of

Lucky was the product of an Australian Shepherd mom and a rottie dad. We were living in a converted school bus on the backside of a racetrack in Arizona, and the people that owned the feed store were trying to find him a home. The boys had to sweep the feed store for two weeks straight to pay for the pup. He taught himself to use the litter box for the cat when he had to stay inside. He would stand between any one of our family members when he thought there was impending danger - he protected me from a 3 ft. long bull snake, the vet from a round pen full of yearling horses. He watched my husband testing out a cutting horse in a pen full of cattle, and when the guys took a break and we turned him loose, he held the cattle at the far end of the pen without any formal education. Lucky saved our truck from being stolen in New York, while we were sitting on a ferry waiting to ride out to the Statue of Liberty. He woke us up one night when the furnace malfunctioned and saved us from being blown sky high. When we were training horses for the public, he would check each new one, and their owner, onto the property. They were then allowed to enter the property without any problem. If you didn't have a horse there, you had better wait till we told him it was okay. He never left the acreage, and wouldn't let any stray wander onto the property. If kittens or foals were born there, it was okay.

One day a cat had her kittens in a round bale outside. We had a spring snow storm, and one of the kittens crawled too far away. I found it while feeding horses, and looked over at Lucky and said that we would have to get them to the house and get them dry and warm. While I took care of the one that was cold and wet, he very carefully brought each baby to the porch and left it at the back door. He weighed 125 pounds.

He was a great dog. He died 8 years ago today at the age of 14.