We adopted Bambi from a rescue at 9.5 weeks and he's now 9 months old. We've done sooo much speculating on his breed mix, and I'm so excited for his Embark results (which are expected this week)! He's a Rez dog from Alberta which has helped inform our guesses, but he has such a mix of traits that I think we may still get some surprises. He comes from a litter of four puppies who all look nearly identical to one another - in fact one of his sisters has recently been attending the same doggie daycare and I kept mistaking her for him on the Insta stories until I figured it out. Mom looks like she could be a shepherd/husky mix, but very small (about 45 lbs) and lighter in colour than her puppies with ears that stick up and a straight tail.
Bambi weighs about 60 lbs at 9 months old. He has floppy (but very expressive) ears, a sable coat, a black mask, and a very curly tail. People tend to think he's a German Shepherd on first glance and I'm sure that's in his mix, but I think it makes up a smaller portion than his coat colour would indicate. He has long legs, a slim body, fully webbed feet, no back dewclaws, a narrow snout, and a double coat that's short along the torso but fluffier on the mane, butt, and tail.
He has normal puppy energy but is overall very chill. He is super smart and a quick learner, and he has a stubborn streak but mainly lives to please us and loves being given things to do. He is insanely cuddly, the biggest mama's boy, and the friendliest dude who absolutely LOVES all people and all other dogs. He happily sleeps in his crate (which he adores), and doesn't bark much but he does grumble and talk back sometimes. He doesn't have a strong prey drive, lets our cats boss him around, and would rather watch squirrels than chase them. He isn't very into fetch, but he does enjoy playing tug, chase, and just generally flinging his toys around. He loves chewing on sticks, wood chips, bones, chews and anything else we give him, shredding cardboard, and destroying random plastic flower pots he finds in the yard. He doesn't eat the stuff he shreds, he just likes the act of shredding. He loves the snow and he loves digging. He's not too sure about swimming yet.
He has been a confident, happy, and independent guy since the day we brought him home and has already been on a cross-Canada roadtrip and many camping and hiking adventures. He's amazing off leash, has no fear of loud noises, calmly hangs out in the backyard by himself, rolls with the punches on any change of routine, doesn't bark when strangers come to the door (or even if they enter the backyard when he's out there as we learned once to our dismay), has no separation anxiety, and as long as he has stuff he's allowed to chew he doesn't chew on the stuff he's not supposed to. He is highly dramatic when he attains even the slightest injury, but then goes back to playing moments later as if nothing happened. He's very sensitive to human and other dog emotions/signals and great at "reading the room". Basically he's perfect and I don't know how we got so lucky!
My top guesses on his breed mix are: German Shepherd (the coat), Malamute (the curly tail and a lot of his personality and behaviour traits), Siberian Husky (his size and the fact that basically every Rez dog has at least some husky), Lab (the floppy ears need to come from somewhere, right?), and Rough Collie (his eyes and snout give Collie for me). Does anyone else care to speculate with me?? I'll definitely post the update as soon as his results come in!