Name: Chelsea, though sometimes we think we should have named her Lady Chelsea because she can be so prim and proper.

Breed: Australian Kelpie / Border Collie cross.

Born: As far as I know, Chelsea was born on a farm outside of Perth. We first came across her at a pet shop in Joondalup when she was 10 weeks old, and though we would have preferred to have adopted a puppy from the local RSPCA, it was love at first sight with her. She was there with her brothers and sisters, though, as she was quite shy, she was kept in a separate kennel from them with two Jack Russells for company. She immediately won us over with her quiet and sweet nature, and make us melt when we took her out of her kennel and she started crawling across the floor on her tummy. At that point, though, we hadn’t decided on a name and so we just went by calling her Cassie until I came up with Chelsea a couple of days later.

About his owners: There are four of us – Byron (brother), Jade (me), Melody (mother) and Robert (father). We live in Duncraig, Western Australia in a house with a fairly small backyard considering Chelsea’s pedigree, though that is more than compensated for with the number of parks (and a couple of beaches) that we take her to.

Why Fido: When we decided to get a puppy shortly after moving into our current house three years ago, we didn’t really have anything specific in mind – just a female (they’re easier to train) mongrel of medium size. As for the rest, it was love at first sight.

What Fido likes: Chelsea LOVES her tennis balls – she goes through two or three of them a WEEK, lol. She likes playing with the neighbour’s cat Raja (sometimes it’s like watching the ‘Garfield and Odie’ show), having her tummy scratched, and being chased around the house.

Chelsea is also a very clever pooch. She does a lot of tricks, like the basic 'sit' and 'stay', but she can also 'beg', give us a 'sad face', 'crawl', 'roll over', 'sing' and play dead (where I point my finger at her like a gun and say 'bang', at which she falls down and rolls halfway onto her back, paws dangling).

Other dogs: We don’t have any other dogs, and she doesn’t really get to socialise with other dogs unless it’s at the park or the beach.