Maybe his name should have been "Frank". It's hard to really see it in this photos, but Cowboy has two beautiful blue eyes! Not that brown eyes aren't lovely too, but with his coloring and markings the blue will look very striking. I'm told his brother has one blue and one gray eye - I bet that's make people look twice.
He is growing quickly and I'm very excited to be getting this little beauty.
For the past six months or so I’d been looking for a male,
blue merle and white Australian Shepherd, with no luck. Most of the breeders in my area have minis;
which I thought I’d like but decided against – no, I wanted a real Aussie. I tried Aussie Rescue sites but all I could
find were postings from back east (I live in Montana), and no one wanted to
send dogs out of state. I even offered
to go and get them and offered references from friends, neighbors and my vet,
but was refused. I don’t understand that – isn’t the purpose of rescue to place
the dogs in permanent homes? WHY would
you turn someone down just because they don’t live “nearby”? .I checked local
shelters, all the way to Helena, Great Falls and Bozeman but almost all of the
dogs in shelters are pit bulls (people PLEASE – do research on breeds before you get a dog!).
Then about a week ago a friend of mine posted photos of a
litter of one week old Aussie pups that her dog had. All black tri's except for
one solid merle and one – male, blue merle and white! He was exactly what I’d been looking for and
I immediately laid claim on him. As most breeders do, she’d named the puppies according
to a theme – this one being evergreen trees.
There was Alberta (spruce), Scotch (Pine), Ponderosa (Pine), Grand
(Fir), Cedar, Spruce, Tamarack and Douglas (fir).
The pup I had chosen was Douglas, but I had picked out my
own puppy name months ago. The breeder
required her kennel name Tower Mountain), on the registration but there were
not enough spaces for the entire name.
To my delight however, she abbreviated her kennel name, so my puppy's registered name would be “TM Ragtime Cowboy Joe”. Because you should never give your pup a name that sounds like a command and because Joe sounds too much like "no", I opted for "Cowboy" as his call name.
His parents are both owned by the breeder and so I knew what their temperaments were like, and they are both stock dog trial champions. This pup has big paws to fill!
These photos were taken by the breeder when Cowboy was two
and three weeks old.
Maybe his name should have been "Frank". It's hard to really see it in this photos, but Cowboy has two beautiful blue eyes! Not that brown eyes aren't lovely too, but with his coloring and markings the blue will look very striking. I'm told his brother has one blue and one gray eye - I bet that's make people look twice. 
For the past six months or so I’d been looking for a male,
blue merle and white Australian Shepherd, with no luck. Most of the breeders in my area have minis;
which I thought I’d like but decided against – no, I wanted a real Aussie. I tried Aussie Rescue sites but all I could
find were postings from back east (I live in Montana), and no one wanted to
send dogs out of state. I even offered
to go and get them and offered references from friends, neighbors and my vet,
but was refused. I don’t understand that – isn’t the purpose of rescue to place
the dogs in permanent homes? WHY would
you turn someone down just because they don’t live “nearby”? .I checked local
shelters, all the way to Helena, Great Falls and Bozeman but almost all of the
dogs in shelters are pit bulls (people PLEASE – do research on breeds before you get a dog!). 
