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Gold Border Collie Pup?


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I think her point was most likely made to indicate she wasn't going to support a "show line" breeder by looking for one in rescue? (since it was in response to Liz saying "buy a dog from show lines").

 

I probably should let her answer, but that's how I took it. (and good for you, SS Cressa, if that's what you meant!)

Oh, gotcha, misunderstood what she was saying. As some one once said about me, am I always that stupid or was I trying particularly hard that day!

 

And, yes, good for her if she chooses rescue!

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I think her point was most likely made to indicate she wasn't going to support a "show line" breeder by looking for one in rescue? (since it was in response to Liz saying "buy a dog from show lines").

 

I probably should let her answer, but that's how I took it. (and good for you, SS Cressa, if that's what you meant!)

 

 

Yes that is what I meant.

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Slightly off topic, but I've always wanted a merle BC, I just don't want show lines or "working" lines that breed for color. How common are merles in working lines?

 

 

Extremely rare. Unless one selects merle coloring in their breeding program, the color goes away. Since working lines generally do not breed for color, you don't see many merles.

 

If you do see a working merle, odds are very strong that there are show or agility lines in the family tree.

 

Personally, I know of 3 blue merle work trial dogs in California. One has just moved to Open, is a soft-ish but willing little girl - with show blood. One is a male in Open, though I have no idea of his pedigree. And the other is a Novice boy, who I think is from agility lines.

 

So ... there you have it. Breeding for the color is pretty much how the color happens. :)

 

~ Gloria

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Extremely rare. Unless one selects merle coloring in their breeding program, the color goes away. Since working lines generally do not breed for color, you don't see many merles.

 

If you do see a working merle, odds are very strong that there are show or agility lines in the family tree.

 

Personally, I know of 3 blue merle work trial dogs in California. One has just moved to Open, is a soft-ish but willing little girl - with show blood. One is a male in Open, though I have no idea of his pedigree. And the other is a Novice boy, who I think is from agility lines.

 

So ... there you have it. Breeding for the color is pretty much how the color happens. :)

 

~ Gloria

 

Thanks!! It's kind of sad. I don't want to support show breeders, but I LOVE color, so beautiful. Maybe I will come across a nice rescue merle :).

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My first dog was a rescue merle. They're out there.J.

 

I got my blue merle border collie from the pound.

 

And this is on craigslist right now, they are saying border collie/collie mix, but he looks pretty much like a gold border collie to me. I am seeing the color more, it must be getting popular :/

 

 

 

http://atlanta.craigslist.org/nat/pet/3194066103.html

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Slightly off topic, but I've always wanted a merle BC, I just don't want show lines or "working" lines that breed for color. How common are merles in working lines?

 

Glad someone asked! I was going to start a thread on this topic, but found this first. I love the merle coloring, but wasn't sure if it would be "easy" to find one from working lines. Maybe my next will have to be a tri... keeping my pack unique :P

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Athena, are you looking now? I just got an email about a 1 year old blue merle male. In North Florida somewhere, so not too far...Let me know if you want contact info. :)

 

ETA: Also, one just posted to the BC Rescue board last night. In Georgia: http://www.bcrescue.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13959

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I thought the dog on FB was a rescue?

 

I understand Rose has some nice dogs, but it doesn't change the fact that she has to put color ahead of other criteria if she wants to keep merle in her lines. And she's one handler out of how many breeding dogs? That still makes merle a tiny percentage of the working population.

 

J.

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I am convinced that this Ee red colour exists in the Australian BC due to an infusion of Australian dingo way back. Our kelpies also have the same Ee red colour known as cream. The BC show people would never accept this, despite early Australian records of breeding the dingo to the BC & kelpie, but the kelpie people are often proud of it.

This is a hard one to prove. There's undoubtedly been dingo-dog crossbreeding in the background of the kelpie, but I'm not convinced it fully explains ee red in our working dogs. Anecdotally, I do know of at least one dog with apparently all UK breeding that was ee red (owned by a local obedience/agility judge before she moved to Australia), but when you look back at the kelpie history records, some of these early dogs recently bred from imported working dogs looked like dingoes- it's often assumed that these "red" pups were brown/chocolate, but it seems far more logical that these were ee red.

 

From the WKC website:

The following description by Mr Phil Mylecharane gives an idea of what Brutus and Jenny looked like and their working ability. 'In 1870 I went out to Mr Allen, of Geraldra Station, to buy flock rams for Goldsborough Mort and Company. When I got there Mr Allen told me the rams were out in the paddock, but he would soon get them in for me. So saying he opened the yard gate, whistled up two smooth, prick-eared black and tan dogs, a male and a female, and sent them out into the paddock. In a very short time they were back with the rams, and put them into the yard. I never saw dogs work sheep like these two did, and noticing that the bitch had pups, made up my mind that I must have one. So after I bought the rams (I took a big lot of them) I asked Mr Allen where he got those dogs. His answer was that they had just imported them from Scotland from a wonderful working strain there; the dog's name was Brutus and the slut Jenny. I asked for a pup. He told me there was only one left, and he thought I wouldn't like its colour. We went around to see the pups, and he pointed mine out, a little red-coloured one, exactly like a dingo; the rest were black and tan. I thought that it was a dingo. Mr Allen assured me that this was impossible, as the pups were sired on board, and every care taken. He advised me to take the pup, and he would write home to the breeders and see about it. I took his advice and the pup. The latter turned out a splendid worker. After having him for two years he was stolen from me down at Coolagong, near Forbes. The next time I saw Mr Allen he told me that the breeders of Brutus and Jenny had written back to say that in nearly every litter they got a similar pup to mine and that they were great workers’.

 

I don't think we'll ever know for sure.

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Just out of curiosity (as I have no particular interest in merle or any other color ;) ) did he/she have talent for stockwork?

No, but when I got him, stockwork wasn't even on my mind. I wanted a jogging and rollerblading partner. He came from an all-breed rescue that took dogs off "death row" (dogs who were due to be euthanized within 24 hours). He was labeled an australian shepherd/border collie mix. His build was more border collie, and many times I wondered if he wasn't purebred, but I got him back in the mid-1990s and you just didn't see merle border collies then, at least not that I was aware of (and he certainly had the bounce/bark of the aussie, so it's likely the mix label was correct).

 

It was only after I got Willow (purebred border collie) from rescue, and later, when I took Farleigh (red, which was unusual enough then that people automatically assumed he was an aussie) with the idea of rehoming that I ended up trying any of them on stock.

 

Indy, the merle, had a little interest in working, but nothing you could really work with. Farleigh would work, had a lovely natural outrun, but had no desire to work with a human--he wouldn't take any training pressure (we used to joke that he would go looking for butterflies). Willow ended up being the rescue star in that regard and went on to become my first trial dog.

 

J.

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Athena, are you looking now? I just got an email about a 1 year old blue merle male. In North Florida somewhere, so not too far...Let me know if you want contact info. :)

 

ETA: Also, one just posted to the BC Rescue board last night. In Georgia: http://www.bcrescue.org/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13959

 

 

So sorry, just now saw this. No, I've got my hands all tied up with my current pup, so it will be awhile before I get another dog. Thanks so much though!! When I decide to get another BC I will post on here and try to rescue a merle!

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  • 2 weeks later...

This pretty much describes how I acquired Kit. When I adopted her from the shelter, I figured she had some bc in her, but not knowing this coloring was present in the breed, I assumed she was a mix. She was about a year old and had been surrendered twice, to different shelters in her young life. This is how she looked the day I took her home.

 

 

newgals0002-1.jpg

 

 

Here she is more recenlty:

IMG_2778.jpg

 

Wow. That is a BEAUTIFUL dog

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