With well over 5000 Instagram followers, Shepparton’s Ollie the border collie knows how to draw in a crowd.
Ollie is the well-trained blue merle border collie, who at one and a half years old is full of energy and spirit, despite his initial shyness and uneasiness around people.
Owner Megan Lock fell in love with Ollie at first sight and knew he was too special to not be shared with others.
“We made the Instagram page because I didn't want to put photos and videos on my own account. I thought I'll just make his own Instagram,” she said.
What she didn’t expect though was a community full of other dog parents, looking to share and exchange experiences about their own pets.
“It's so strange because it's like a community. All these dog mums and dads just have their own accounts; like, I had no idea anything like this existed,” she said.
“Everyone loves their dogs so it’s a huge dog-loving community. It’s actually so helpful too as I’ve gotten so many tips about his training.”
Megan and her partner, Hernan Pavez, have spent countless hours with Ollie getting him trained.
Ollie follows instructions at the click of a finger. He can shake (both hands and feet), spin, run between Megan’s legs on command and more.
“He's great to train, he loves training; even from when he was a puppy we used to always just do heaps of trick training with them,” Megan said.
“At the moment, we're mainly working on just him being comfortable around people.”
Trick training involves rewarding dogs with treats as an incentive to follow commands, and Ollie is a perfect example of how successful it can be.
Despite the tricks and training Ollie has mastered, he still hasn’t quite got the hang of being off the leash, according to Megan.
“He's never off-leash fully, just because he's still training; like, he's only a year-and-a-half old and we’re just trying to train him to make the right choices,” she said.
“He has a 10m-long line. So we take him to an oval like this and I just put him on the 10m lead and he has the full 10 metres to run around.”
Border collies are known for their almost limitless energy and Ollie is no exception.
“As a border collie, he's quite an active dog, as he’s a working dog, and he’d rather play tug or fetch so we don't take him on heaps of walks. But lots of play, he loves it,” Megan said.
“We go for a 15-minute walk and it’s like nothing to him.”
Ollie’s high energy isn’t just for when he’s running around and playing with Megan — his stuffed whale he’s had since he was eight weeks old has also taken the brunt.
“It’s fully destroyed, but he still loves it,” Megan said.
“It used to squeak and now the squeak is gone. It used to have stuffing in it, and now the stuffing’s gone. There’s not much left of it. I don't even think it looks like a whale any more.
“He just makes us so so happy. My partner’s owned a dog before but I haven't — he brings so much joy. He just has all these weird quirks about him to make us laugh, which we love.”
To check out Ollie’s Instagram page find him @_olliethebordercollie_