We’ve all heard of small dog syndrome, but little Jimmy, a one-year-old miniature dachshund, embodies the definition in more ways than one.
He is the boss of all the animals in the house of six.
While that might go without saying, when two of them are turtles and two of them are cats, to gain the upper hand over your canine ‘cousin’ when she weighs 20kg to your 6kg is quite the hierarchical feat.
Jimmy is one year old and belongs to Shepparton’s Hannah Bilney and her two-year-old son, Hudson.
Jimmy’s ‘cousin’ is Hannah’s brother’s 11-month-old Dalmatian, Lexi.
If Lexi puts down a toy for a second or two, Jimmy takes it — not to play with it though, just to assert his dominance and remind everyone he owns everything.
He has small legs that his small dog syndrome-controlled inner voice tells him are more like greyhound legs, so he exercises them like that and can, over short distances, run quicker than his much longer-legged cousin Lexi.
He even thinks his small stomach can hold more than hers, with an unmatched appetite for food that sees him first at the bowl at meal-time and the one who returns to the buffet over and over, thinking it’s some kind of all-you-can-eat smorgasbord.
The humans he lives with (five of them) say he’s bossy but lovable.
The purebred enjoys watching animated versions of his species on Bluey with Hudson, sleeping, playing, barking and playing chasey with Lexi. He uses his compact size as an advantage to go underneath things that she can’t.
When the day is over and he’s exerted all his energy, his favourite thing to do with his human mum is snuggle under the blankets with her in bed or inside any number of fleecy things she’s wearing, such as an Oodie.
Jimmy lines up for treats alongside Lexi when Lexi is having a training session, but doesn’t do much to earn them.
Joel (Lexi’s owner and Jimmy’s human uncle) says Jimmy’s tummy is so close to the ground that it looks like he’s lying down anyway, so he offers up his treats to appease his furry nephew.
Despite bossing her around, Jimmy and Lexi have been friends since the moment they met.
The family wouldn’t call the cats the pair’s friends, but also not enemies; they just stay out of each other’s ways.
Being surrounded by barking and purring, meowing and play-growling is second-nature to the pet-loving family.
“We’ve just always had pets, even before kids came along,” Hannah’s mum (Jimmy’s human grandmum), Jac Bilney, said.
“Zach, our Staffy, was a wedding gift when Shane (Jac’s husband) and I got married.”
Jimmy, the little dog who tries to be a big dog, is not slated for any show competitions or siring duties now he’s fixed.
The family also has no plans to add more animals to its menagerie at this stage, so little Jimmy won’t have to assert his dominance over any further fur siblings for a while.
He can sit comfortably at the top of the pecking order he’s created in his confident — and cute — tiny little head for now.