First Meeting

We drove four hours to the mountainous areas of Georgia to see the 5-week-old puppies... and it was well worth it. By the time we got there, there were two girls and one boy left (out of a litter of eight). They were all sired by a pure-bred, registered Shiba Inu, and the mother was a light-colored Siberian Husky, neither of which exceeded 30lbs. Both were on site, and we were able to look at them.

Initially, William wanted to get the last boy, but he quickly changed his mind (and put down the poor little guy) when the puppy went number-two on him. Meanwhile, I picked up the darker colored little girl and held her for a while. As I held her and looked at her, we locked eyes and I could swear she talked to me; it was more mewing then anything else, but she had already stolen my heart.

Finally, William made me put her down so that we could consider all of the puppies, and as soon as I did, she did her duty on the floor. Quickly behind her came the other girl (a lighter coated puppy) who began to eat her poop! From then, our final decision was going to be the dark-coated puppy, who sat in the corner away from her poop as her remaining brother and sister played in it.

We had a week before we could go get her, so we went home and prepared for our new puppy, who we still hadn't named yet. Finally, we settled on "Pepper," for her dark coat.

Shiba Inu or Siberian Husky

I wanted to rescue a dog or adopt one from the local shelter, but William was against it. He wanted to know for sure what his dog was so that he could know what to expect behavior-wise. I couldn't blame him... a small part of me wanted to know, too. Don't get me wrong; I REALLY wanted to adopt one from the shelter... but at the same time I wanted to make sure that I could be as prepared as I possibly could, for the sake of the dog and for myself, and that meant knowing what your dog was so that you'd know what to expect.

So, after a LOT of researching and arguing, William and I narrowed it down to two breeds: William wanted a Siberian Husky and I wanted a Shiba Inu. Even a pet compatibility test put Shiba Inu in our top 3... but he really wanted a husky. Why? They were smart dogs and they were pretty. Living in South Carolina, though, I knew that would not be in the best interest for the dog, and so was dead-set on getting a Shiba. Be that as it may, I occasionally kept an eye out for Huskies, just to give him a glimmer of hope.

We looked EVERYWHERE... shelters, pet stores, newspapers and websites... until finally, we found a semi-local breeder who had just had a litter of --you guessed it!-- Shiba Inu/ Siberian Husky puppies!