Pinkspore, Timeless sounds like a good choice for the minis! Out of breeder puppy choices, I'd still prefer to go with standard Aussie showlines, if the possibilities of being solid in both are even about equal. Devan just recommended TreeStarr in Missouri, produced the foundation dog of Oracle, so hopefully I can get some insight about the situation with Becky!
Liminal, that's interesting to know about the Catahoula working lines, and unfortunate imo... That's exactly what I mean, and it's apparently very much the same vein with Aussie farm-bred stocklines (if they're even appropriately referred to as lines LOL). When I picked out Lancer's litter randomly, I really didn't have an idea of the differentiation between working lines from "breeder breeders" and stocklines from straight up ranchers/farmers... (amongst many other aspects of how genetics affects a dog that I had no idea how important LOL.)
All I was thinking at the time was to have an Aussie who is drivey and athletic enough to do agility with me (actually 3 years ago already), I had no idea that anything past that really mattered that much, and I was uneducated about the complexities of breeding beyond that. So I saw, "Oh, ranch dogs = "working lines" = must be perfect!" Nahh.. :hail:
Aaaand Lancer history!
So during his fear period (around 7 months~1.5 years old) when he was most severe, his innate reaction to any source of fear was charging to attack: snarling and hackles and lips and saliva and DOG HIMSELF flying practically in the air towards the object of his fear at its worst. He had an extremely, extremely low threshold to other dogs in particular. If they're 100 meters away, he was put over threshold into aggression mode. I can say with confidence that his issues were uniquely severe ha ha ha. <_<
We've also had a particularly terrible experience with an idiotic dog owner (stranger) while Lancer was in training, who literally TRAPPED us in a corner of a park, so we can't flee, and he apparently thought that he knew our issues and could fix Lancer on the spot with his "stern gaze" and TWO DOGS next to him, and bull*** advice.... AFTER I told him that we are in training and he and his dogs need to stay back. He replied thinking that I just don't know how to train dogs, and insisted that Lancer MEET HIS **** DOGS. Obviously Lancer was completely and utterly flipping his **** shiz like the most terrifying exotic animal you've ever seen, and the man refused to leave for about 3 minutes while this happened lmao. They were standing only about 6 feet from us. I'm 100% sure that this experience exacerbated his fears x100. During that time, Lancer was also hyper-sensitive to negative experiences and does not bounce back well from even a minor experience at all.
The only reason why I know that it's based in fear is that if we both see them first (before they see us) from VERY far away, his first response is to whimper/yelp/bark/try to tug off the leash in the opposite direction, and display normal fearful body language.
So currently, he's really improved quite significantly after some unconventional but simple training (who the 2 dog trainers we've worked with did not think of). He's now learned to pretend that the presence of other dogs doesn't exist, even if they're within 20 feet from us, which is completely amazing (again... relatively). 1% of the time, usually when we're trapped between 2 dogs and Lancer is put a bit over treshold, Lancer will bark a few times/snarl if they're too close, but it's totally fine in comparison.
(I wrote a novel, God forbid anyone bothers to read this LOL)