Mischief is a daughter of Monty that was raised on our farm. Her primary job is keeping my little sister out of trouble, but she also helps my parents take care of the livestock. She is gentle on all the livestock even the baby goats and always seems to know when she should help on the livestock and when she should stay out of the way. She works in the open in a calm and collected manner without upsetting the animals. In fact, on a good day, you don't realize she is doing anything but hanging out with the livestock, but the moment one animal tries to head the wrong direction she has it turned around and back with the group. Mischief truly shines while working in the small pen and chute though. She keeps a parameter between whoever is in the pen and the cattle. She calmly and steadily works them into the trailer or headgate and can get fierce as a little devil if a cow tries to back out of the chute from the trailer. Rose Marie almost refuses to work cattle in the small pens and chutes if Mischief isn't around because she doesn't feel safe without her there. She is the alpha female among our dogs and has a calm but dominate personality.

One of my favorite websites on oldtime working Aussies is Working Aussie Source. In their stockdog library, they explain several times that aussies are classically "loose-eyed" working dogs. They also define the classic loose-eyed in their glossary in following way: "loose-eyed (adj) a dog that works upright, without crouching or overt staring. The opposing term is strong-eyed. Loose-eyed dogs tend to work closer to their stock, tend to desire to keep the stock moving, and tend to be more naturally comfortable in close quarters such as stockyards, chutes, and pens, than dogs with strong eye." This description completely matches Mischief's working style.

Its worth pointing out that Mischief's main negative factor (depending on your viewpoint) is that she likes to think for herself. Once you tell her what you want done, she is going to do it how she sees best, and if you try micromanaging her, she will likely ignore you. For example, her priority list in working cattle into the trailer is the following: 1. Keep the cows from trampling the family. 2. Put the cows in the trailer. On a few occasions, we have gotten confused and worked the wrong steer into the chute to be loaded. If Lou suddenly realizes this he may (very loudly and authoritatively, i.e. yelling like a bull in the china closet) tell Mischief to let the steer loose before he completely considers the implications of that command. Mischief usually decides 1. Letting the steer charge out of the chute will result in a trampled Rose Marie (who doesn't move out of the way very fast with a her bad knee) and 2. She did alot of work already getting that steer to the trailer so why stop now. Mischief is going to put the steer trailer and the loud, yelling man can take him back out later if he wants. For trialing, Mischief would need a lot of extra work to get her to listen to you. For practical life, most people prefer her sensible, if hard-headed approach. Its stopped a few broken bones at least. Please note that if we are simple farmers and know very little about how to best train dogs. I'm sure with a good trainer this aspect of Mischief's personality would be minimized.

Mischief is exactly the type of dog we would like to continue breeding, and we are proud to have her as a foundation for the future. We currently have two females out of Mischief- Little Miss and Shae. Little Miss lives and works on the farm in Arkansas. She is almost an identical replica of Mischief physically, but she is more biddable. Shae is a red merle female from a Mischief X Joe cross born in 2008. She went to Columbia, MO to live with Angela as a present for graduating for the last time. Shae has more of Mischief's stubborn streak, but she is very bonded and wants to please Angela. Shae hasn't been used on stock much due to living in the city, but she has shown considerable promise at agility and will hopefully start trialing soon if Angela gets her courage up.