This is Georgie as a Puppy. He is a Shetland Sheep Dog, or Sheltie, and has no toes at all on his left rear leg. Oh yeah, he has his own very dramatic rescue story!

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Georgie's story:

Our prior Sheltie, Tuki, was put to sleep as a result of uncontrollable idiopathic epilepsy. We were heartbroken. We don't deal well with animal deaths. We also do not do well dogless.

We love Shelties-- they are small dogs with big dog personalities -- and after a time we went looking for another. I found several within a fairly close driving distance but eventually focused on"Georgie," even though he didn't live closeby, because he was apparently unadoptable.  He was the last puppy of championship dog parents, which was a plus. However, George had no toes on his left rear foot, due to complications from dog-birth, which was a big minus for people looking for show dogs. As I said, they don't let you show a dog with no toes.

Shelties should be adopted at a very early age so as to bond closely to their families, as otherwise they can be reclusive and afraid. George was way beyond the age of adoption. Of course, even though this might have meant that he could have some 'personality' issues, being who we are, we wanted him immediately. However, the breeders still wanted nearly full price for him, and Georgie was expensive. They were very ambivalent about him, but wanted every dime ("if you were to look at him you wouldn't even know he doesn't have any toes." "He walks and runs perfectly fine, no limping whatsoever. "). I tried to haggle, but something in their tone made me believe that he was about to be sold to a glue factory.  Bargaining got me nowhere--not that I'm very good at it.

So, after a few dozen conversations where I begged my husband to loosen his grip on the family finances (and where I told him a little fib about the price), we hit the road on our rescue mission.

My husband and I drove up to Dallas, from Baton Rouge, with money we did not have, paid for George and brought him home. I'm so glad we did. He is perfect for us: he doesn't bark, he follows us around everywhere, 'gardens' with my mother (by that I mean he stays outside with her, without moving, basically on-point), sleeps at our side, and literally lets our grandson 'ride' him. Any other dog would snap or bite, but George doesn't have a mean bone in his body.

And yes he limps and did so from the second we laid eyes on him.

Don't get me started on dog breeders!