Max was the product of breeding my first purebred Aussie, Kiss, to a great working dog named WTCH Judd's Chickasaw Dan.  I had decided that Kiss was not an average Aussie, but one with exceptional talent.   I started looking through the Aussie Times and saw a photo of a dog that really caught my attention.  He seemed to have a lot of eye, as Kiss did, so I looked at the owner's address.  It was in Kingston Springs, Tennessee which was only 45 minutes from my home town.  I was not the only person who noticed Dan.  In the spring of '91 there were nine outside bitches bred to Dan that came from Slash V (Terry Martin), Red Oliver, Lori Middleton, and Jerry Dennison, just to name a few.  My Kiss' litter from Dan was born and Max was a very calm, confident pup that really caught my attention.  Dan later became my pick of the litter.

I had kept in touch with the Judds and there was a clinic with Bob Vest at their place on Thanksgiving in 1991.  Max was 7 months old at the time of the clinic so I decided to take him along to watch and get a little socialization.  When Bob Vest asked me to bring him in iwth the sheep and said, "let's just see what his interest in stock is", I jumped at the chance.  We let him gently move the sheep around a little.  Then came the real show.  Bob had Lynn (WTCH Vest Belle Start Lynn) in to move the sheep tot he pup and Max held the sheep and had the Power at that age to keep the sheep from moving past/over him with Lynn on the other side pushing.  I was hooked on this ASCA Stockdog thing.

Max and his dam Kiss, wer the first Aussies that I started Training for trials.  The first trial in Texas brought his first titles on Cattle and Sheep as well as Most Promising Started.  I thought he could walk on water.  Then back at the ranch, he started working cow/calf pais on a 450 head experiment station.  We moved 40-head groups to the pens on a regular basis.  This tough faily work took away alot of finesse that trialing requires.  The most consistent comment on his score sheets was POWER.  We one the Chickasaw Dan Futurity and a few jackpots along the way.  However, we never traveled enough to qualify for Finals.

Perhaps my favorite story about Max was about one day penning cow/calf pairs.  There was one Brangus first calf heifer that was obnoxiously protective of her calf.  When we got to the alley of the pens, she lost track of her calf in the mob.  She turned and challenged each horse/rider that came up.  I finally decided she had to be pushed up if we were going to get done that day.  I moved my mare closer.  The cow charged and began pounding on the mare's chest.  I didn't have time to say anything.  All i heard was that familiar growl right underneath me.  Max had come up between the mare's front legs and nailed the cow in the head a couple of times to get her off.