AKDD speaks...

Ahhh, yes, my nefarious plot has come to fruition! BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

::waggles eyebrows, twirls imaginary Snidely Whiplash moutsache::

Truthfully, it can't ALL be blamed on me.... MaskedMan has dog lust. I've seen it. It was only a matter of time.

Suka (indeed pronounced "Sooka" - that would be like "Sue-ka" not like "took") is (and I do hate to burst any bubbles) actually named accidentally after a Sibe belonging to my nurse Jill. As she came into my hands, her name was Sukie, which I think is a cute name for a Shih Tzu or a Lhasa, but NOT for a BC. And I just couldn't make myself say it. I kept accidentally calling her Suka (from knowing Jill's dog) and Jill didn't mind me copycatting (copy-dogging?) one of her dogs' names, plus Suka comes to it readily, so there we are. It didn't occur to me to ask Jill what "Suka" meant, but I will. I thought about calling her "Sitka" (a good Alaskan name), but she seems to like Suka, so there she stays... unless MaskedMan et al want to change it. [NB: NO, we do not. :-p ] Meanwhile.... Uh, Suka is an obscure word of a little-known Yupik dialect which means "sweet bird of the snow" and is sometimes used to indicate the color of ptarmigan when they are in the middle of their molt from the russety browns of summer to the white of winter. Yeah. That's the ticket. (Yes, I AM a member of the PLO... Pathological Liars OOOoooononymous.) Or, it could be some derivative of Susitna, which is the name of a mountain and a river and all kinds of other things up here. It could be SU from SUsitna, and KA from MatanusKA, another native place name (Suka's earliest known history having sourced from the Matanuska-Susitna borough.) See? We can make it all KINDS of Alaskan!

I suspect Suka is a BC/Sheltie cross or else a BC/Sammy cross, but it's a guess. Short of DNA testing, there's no telling; she could be all BC for all I know. [NB: I'm thinking more likely Sammy than Sheltie, but it doesn't really matter anyway. And canine DNA testing is notoriously unreliably anyway. :-p ] Her early history is unknown, having come to the prior owner from the pound. She was a patient of mine several years ago, at which time there was a chance her (divorcing) owners might need to place her. At the time, I had 2 fewer dogs than I have now, and I told them that I'd consider taking her if they couldn't work it out (although as she had a little boy at home who is mad for her, I didn't want to break that up - and they did work it out that time.) Several years later and a re-marriage/newly pregnant new wife down the road, the owner was again facing a problem with keeping her. He hated to do it - he kept saying that she was the best dog he'd ever had - but the little boy had moved to CA with the first wife, and with a new baby on the way, and the man being a trucker and not home all the time to help with the baby and the dog, Suka didn't have anywhere to land. So I bailed her out temporarily, and Tranq and family are going to see if she'll work out for them long-term. But we should all give Tranq a BIIIG pat on the back, because I struck out on finding other homes up here. So he bailed her out even more than I did... I'm just his long-distance minion.

(See? It really ISN'T my fault.... Entirely.)

She's a sweet dog, extremely affectionate, and generally gets on fine with other dogs - but there are just too many dogs here right now, and I personally think that as much as she loves to snuggle, she would be best in a single dog household. It does my heart good to know how excited Tranq and all the Mrs/mini-Tranqs are about her. She deserves a home where they're excited about her and can make her the center of the dog-attention (and here, even if I was NOT over the borough limit on dogs, she would have to share.)

I love it when a plan comes together!

[NB: 'Suka' is actually a Russian word. It means 'Bitch.' Considering how appropriate a Russian name is, coming from a place so closely connected with Russian history, and that Suka is, indeed, in the most technically correct use of the word, a bitch, I'm keeping the name.

And yes, my sister is even more devious than you thought. :-p]