Discworld & all associated characters the property of Terry Pratchett - I just play around with them for my own amusement.
Familiar
Witches have always tended towards cats as pets. Cats are mysterious, aloof and often fiercely independent, a combination of traits shared by many witches. Cats also just work when it comes to looking witchy, there's no denying it.
Tiffany had toyed with the idea of a cat. Something to have around the cottage - she was finally in her own cottage, after a fashion. How they had hidden it from her she still didn't know, but one fine summer day she had been shown up to the Down, where a shepherding hut was waiting for her. It was easier than living permanently at home, she didn't wake her parents or Wentworth every time there was a late night emergency, and the privacy was nice.
It helped with the Boffo as well. Though it was not unusual for a lad or lass to live at home until they were married, witches tended to move out early. A witch living at home was still somehow a child, yet a witch was not a child, no matter how young. Witches needed independence, privacy and respect. She still had free run of the home farm dairy, and tried to take regular meals back on the farm. She was busy, of course, and her days were never empty, but sometimes it could be almost lonely in the hut, even with her permanent entourage of Feegles*.
It was just after Hogswatch when someone brought her the puppies. Their mother had passed away while birthing, and the farmer couldn't look after them himself. With a sigh she had agreed to find homes for them, and taken the warm box from him. It had meant a whole host of extra jobs, feeding and checking for fleas, even basic household training.
It didn't take long to find homes for three of the four black and white bundles of fur. They were from good stock, healthy and likely to be good sheepdogs once they'd grown up and been trained. The last she worried about for a week before reaching a decision.
Tiffany had often thought about getting a cat, because a cat is a witches pet. But she didn't need a cat to be a witch.
She was the Hag o' the Hills, and she walked the downs with her sheepdog by her side.
* A cat would have also have kept the mice down, except that with Feegles about, mice and rats were conspicuously absent.
The idea of Tiffany being given a surprise cottage up on the Downs of her own was based on this fanfic s/6652932/1/The-Cottage-on-the-Chalk, which is a lovely little one-shot and if I'm honest, is exactly the backstory I am assuming for how Tiffany got her cottage here - only I've switched it to being a Sheparding Hut like Granny Aching's in my own headcanon.
Concept of Tiff with a sheepdog not entirely new to me, but solidified after seeing a post on Tumblr about Discworld daemons, which very appropriately gave Tiffany a sheepdog rather than the typical witch's cat daemon.