Sharon Rowe found her first Australian Shepherd in the early 1960s. She fell in love with the brains, working ability, and looks of the breed and dedicated a large part of her time to helping the early aussie clubs form. She was instrumental in starting one of the first Australian Shepherd clubs, the Australian Shepherd Club of Colorado. for many years she served the club in the capacities of president, secretary, treasurer, newsletter editor, as well as writing many informative articles about this new breed.
Because Sharon loved the versatility of this breed, she spent a lot of time working with the national club promoting the versatility aspect of the aussie. She was one of the first people to encourage the parent club to develop a breed standard and served on the committee that drafted the first one. She also was one of the people who helped negotiate the unification of the IASC and ASCA. Sharon was also very involved with attempting to standardize the breed and worked hard on setting up a viewing committee so that everything that was a blue merle would not be registered as an aussie.
During her many years in the breed, Sharon has successfully trialed aussies in the working arena as well as the obedience and conformation ring. She is a senior breeder judge for ASCA and especially enjoys judging the versatility class.
Author of the 1970’s book Pups ‘n Stuff, one of the very first books about breeding dogs that featured Australian Shepherds, Sharon also took time to teach 4-H obedience classes.
Today she can be found video taping and taking pictures of camp participants, and always has a helpful piece of wisdom or encouragement for the campers. She is well versed in many aspects of homeopathy, Bach flower, and Shaklee Food Supplements. A good discussion about our dogs’ health is always enjoyed by Sharon after a hard day of herding and training.
Jerry and Sharon have been married for 60 years and raised 3 kids and currently have 8 grandsons and nine great grand children. One is a girl! Only one in the bunch. They currently have 5 Aussies. Tank is 16 years old, Dee 13 years, Jim 7 years, Desi 2 years, and Stryker (Jake) 1 year. They all enjoy going to trials when they are not judging or giving clinics.
In 2001, Jerry and Sharon purchased a farm in Kansas that is perfectly suited for training dogs, raising sheep and establishing a training center. This is fulfilling another dream they have always had – “To bring small groups together to train their dogs in a vacation atmosphere.“