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CurlyQ
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While not specifically border related, there was a poem in here I thought suited the breed well. It's a book called Dog Songs and it's by Mary Oliver. The collection of poems is quite interesting, and some I really like while some I really don't.

 

Here's a poem I believe captures the true difference between a show dog and a herding border collie. Ricky is the dog, for people (like me) who didn't catch it right off the bat.

 

SHOW TIME

 

"And here come the dogs. Brushed, trimmed, polished.

 

'What on earth have they done to them!' said Ricky. 'They're half shaved. And wearing pillows on their heads. And where are their tails?'

 

It's the rules, I said.

 

'And look at those women trying to run. They sure don't look like you.'

 

Thank you, I said.

 

'I'm getting a headache looking at this. I have to bark!' And he began.

 

It does no good to bark at the television, I said. I've tried it too. So he stopped.

 

'If I ever meet one of these dogs I'm going to invite him to come here, where he can be a proper dog.'

 

Okay, I said. But remember, you can't fix everything in the world for everybody.

 

'However,' said Ricky, 'you can't do anything at all unless you begin. Haven't I heard you say that once or twice, or maybe a hundred times?'"

 

I hope I posted this in the right place! Also, this is not, by any means, meant to bash show dogs. Or even show border collies! The border collie is a breed that I consider having a deep gap between showing and herding dogs, and I believe this poem perfectly illustrates that. I think the AKC (or any organization like it) was trying to do the right thing by preserving the breed, and the shepherds were trying to do the right thing by preserving the spirit.

 

The poem would obviously be from the point of view of the shepherd. I'm interested in a poem from the other side, and I like to imagine what it would be like. Both sides of the argument believe what they're doing is right, and I'm all for doing what you believe in.

 

Anyway, I just thought it'd be neat to share this. Thoughts, opinions on it?

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I think the AKC (or any organization like it) was trying to do the right thing by preserving the breed

 

The poem's cool.

 

But I don't believe for a second that the ACK had any interest in "preserving the breed", despite whatever spin they may have put on it. :wacko: If they were truly trying to preserve the breed, they would have left breeding up to the working sheepdog folks and left the border collie out of the conformation ring.

 

It was never about anything other than money for them, which is the status quo.

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Well that's an interesting take on the AKC's position. I guess they were pulling the wool over my eyes (hehe, punny). To be honest, I side with the sheep dogs more than the conformationally bred dogs, just because I think spirit is more important than looks.

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It's interesting, if you look at the early days of the registration of sheep dogs (when collies were originally registered), the intent wasn't to preserve the breed or its looks, it was to improve the appearance.

 

The shepherd's dog was considered to be intelligent but ugly. There was a move away from black and white dogs (the earlier colour of the collie) and towards more colour, more coat, different eye position, slimmer faces etc as you can see today. Some people had the idea that they would improve the appearance and then cross back to the original shepherd's dog to keep intelligence and temperament, which they could see were declining in their dogs. They knew the breed was preserved because shepherds still had them (and that dog became the border collie, the 'improved' version became the collie), same story as it is today.

 

The AKC's registrations have been declining for a while, so they want to get more breeds in each year and they're registering puppy mill pups to make up the difference. There was huge debate over registering the border collie, the jack russell etc, many people were strongly against it.

 

Donald McCaig literally wrote the book on this. There's an article here too.

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I love the poem from the dog's point of view.

 

I have read a few articles on those show dogs and I felt so sorry for them. One I read on had never even been outside in the grass, always pampered. They must put them on a treadmill or something to keep them fit. A dog (of any breed) should be allowed to be a dog, run, play be outside, roll in the mud. How can they possibly keep the spirit alive if they are not allowed to be dogs.

 

Secondly how in the world could they possibly have a show dog that is a border collie? They are so many variations and colors, smooth coat, rough coat, sizes vary, ears vary, so how do they decide what is a standard border collie? I don't see how they possibly could without eliminating a good part of the breed to qualify for it.

 

I will take my girl over any show dog any day of the week!!

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CurlyQ, I was going to suggest you read Donald McCaig's Dog Wars, but since it's already been done I'll enthusiastically second it.

 

You mention in your first post about the ACK wanting to preserve the breed. The thing is that border collies, perhaps more than most other breeds, are what they are because of what they do, not how they look.

 

I'd be interested in know how many ACK border collies you've met, vs. the number of working sheepdogs (especially at work). Even if it's only been a few of each, the difference is huge, and readily apparent.

 

Interesting choice of words, "spirit." At first I was going to object to it, because border collies are about the work. But then I realized that it's not only the working ability that's missing from the ACK show barbie collies I've met. The are decidedly lacking in spirit as well. :blink:

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It's interesting, if you look at the early days of the registration of sheep dogs (when collies were originally registered), the intent wasn't to preserve the breed or its looks, it was to improve the appearance.

 

I'm curious . . . who's registration of sheep dogs are you referring to?

 

The Kennel Club in the UK was founded in 1873. From the KC web site: "The founders of the Kennel Club wanted to ensure that all Dog Shows and Field Trials were run fairly and honestly and with the welfare of the dogs in mind so they set up the Kennel Club to govern these events nationwide." AFAIK, "field trials" referred to hunting dog events and did not include sheep dog trials.

 

From the ISDS' web page, "The International Sheep Dog Society (ISDS) was founded in 1906 with the intention of stimulating interest in the shepherd, the shepherd's calling and to secure the better management of stock by improving the shepherd's dog."

 

So, the early registration of sheep dogs, it's purpose and outcome, depends entirely on which registration you're referring to.

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I was unaware of AKC's certain involvement with puppy mills, byb, etc. So, I did a couple hours of reading and watched an hour long documentary, so I could give you guys a more educated response. I apologize for my misguided phrasing earlier.

 

Simba: That's quite interesting, I didn't know that they had actually tried to make the dogs look a bit more easier on the eye (not that it's necessary). My favorite colors on bcs are the traditional black and white, and if I had to pick a second I'd say red and white. I guess that makes me a simple person :lol: . I cannot really comment on other appearance changes, since I tried and could not find a bc who looked any different from the ones we see today. Would you mind posting an image? Since I'm assuming this change predates common photography, even a painting would be okay.

 

I am astounded to hear that the AKC is registering puppy mills and breeders of the like. Sometimes I think the AKC gets caught up in most of the dog-world problems simply because they're the 'top dogs' when it comes to things like these. But registering these mills makes me want to lock them in cages that are six inches wider than their body on either side and see how they'd like it. It's unacceptable. But we also have to consider how many breeds they have 'preserved' that would be extinct by now. This internal argument I'm having with myself is tearing me apart. The AKC may be in it for money, but they're also holding past breeds that would be lost without them.

 

Right now I have a long list of books to read, but The Dog Wars is now on it. Forgive me if it takes a while to get to it.

 

Mom of Mya: My thoughts exactly. Not only have I seen this problem frequently occurring with show dogs (primarily the toy breeds), but human children as well! And you're right. Border collies don't have a standard... you should be able to tell they're a border collie by seeing the gears working up in their noggin.

 

GentleLake: To be quite honest, most (if not all) of the bcs I have met in person came from an AKC breeder. I have watched a ton of trialing videos (since it's something I've always been really interested in), however, and I agree with you. The differences are vast and readily apparent.

 

Also, by 'spirit' I meant something along the lines of what it is to be a dog. To a border collie, that means work. But you're right as well; show dogs seem to lack the certain raw energy the working pooches have.

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The 'improved' dogs are the Lassie collie you see today, rather than border collies at all. A dog called Old Cockie born in 1876 was the first collie that has the lassie colour. If you look at older books, before Old Cockie, these dogs are almost all black and white, they were much less uniform in type/shape/coat.

 

Take the same gene pool and breed for work and you get the border collie. Remember, in the 1800s people were still interbreeding the types and thought of them as one breed. I have a book here written in 1890 which lists the British collies as the Scotch collie, the old English bob-tailed collie, and the smooth coated colllie- 'other so-called varieties are but local names for the same articles.'

 

The difference is literally that one collie was bred for work and trialling and one as a pet and for showing, starting with the same basic materials.

 

The AKC and rare breeds. A question for you- what do they do to preserve them?

 

I mean, they can't force anyone to breed or buy those breeds, it's the fanciers who actually do the work and they already do that outside the AKC. That's why the AKC can recognise new breeds every year- they take in existing small breeds. In joining the AKC it provides a potentially heavy selection for a particular type (the 'breed standard'- another measure likely to lead to genetic loss in a small breed) and then closes off the gene pool.

 

They may, rather than saving those breeds, simply be preventing genetic outcrosses that could really save the breed- if you have a small population of animals interbreeding with no new blood it's only a matter of time before bad things happen.

 

If no-one wants to buy that breed then it's over. If they do, it could be 'preserving' the breed at the potential or actual expense of the dogs. As is done by the AKC in supporting puppy mills (harming the actual dogs) while theoretically preserving breeds. What is being preserved, and why?

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I can't claim to know anything about this, but aren't there breeds that by this point are defined by the AKC? That don't really have anything else to define them by, unlike the border collie? So I would think opening up the gene pool would start to change it into a completely different breed. Or is there something I'm missing?
Either way, I'm not sure I agree with it being a good thing. What is the point is preserving a breed just for looks? Is the breed worth preserving? I guess it comes down to why we choose different breeds in the first place.

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AFAIK, each breed's "parent" club determines the breed standard. In the case of new breeds being recognized by the ACK, that standard has to be well established before the parent club applies to be recognized. At the point of recognition, the existing stud books are handed over to the ACK.

 

I would think opening up the gene pool would start to change it into a completely different breed.

 

I'm not understanding your point here. A stud book effectively closes the gene pool (with rare exceptions like the ISDS' and ABCA's ROM), which prevents it from becoming a different breed. The existing breed can be rendered almost unrecognizable through selective breeding pressure within the existing gene pool combined with changing trends in what's fashionable in the breed at any given time.

 

For example, the AKC standard states of the Cocker Spaniel's coat:

Coat
On the head, short and fine; on the body, medium length, with enough undercoating to give protection. The ears, chest, abdomen and legs are well feathered, but not so excessively as to hide the Cocker Spaniel's true lines and movement or affect his appearance and function as a moderately coated sporting dog. The texture is most important. The coat is silky, flat or slightly wavy and of a texture which permits easy care. Excessive coat or curly or cottony textured coat shall be severely penalized. Use of electric clippers on the back coat is not desirable. Trimming to enhance the dog's true lines should be done to appear as natural as possible. (http://www.akc.org/breeds/cocker_spaniel/breed_standard.cfm, emphasis added).

 

When was the last time you saw a show Cocker with a medium length coat that was not excessive? They're not only not being severely penalized for long, flowing coats. Quite the opposite, Cockers without excessive, flowing coats can't get championships in the current climate.

 

Still, the dogs are recognizable as Cocker Spaniels, despite the fact that the breed standard isn't being strictly followed. They haven't become a different breed.

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Okay, so when a breed joins the AKC they close off the gene pool, which effectively locks the breed in the place and standard is it at the time it's registered. Right? If they didn't do that, could the breed continue to evolve until it became completely different and the original "standard" was lost?
Again, not saying I agree with it, just trying to understand.

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Chene- opening up the gene pool, done in a limited and careful way, doesn't actually lead to that much difference in type after a few generations of crossing back with the existing members of that breed. I'm not sure how regularly exactly you can do it without developing some changes, but cross to a related breed and then cross the offspring to purebreds and it's amazing how quickly they revert to type. People who breed lurchers know this, they can go back very quickly. Plus some dog breeds are very related anyway- like crossing red and red and white Irish setters, which was done by the Irish Kennel Club.

 

Basset hounds were crossed with bloodhounds- I have a basset hound book from the 1900s (1940s I think?) which was written by someone who had known about this and recommended it as a practice to improve head type, because apparently a bloodhound has a head that looks more like a perfect basset hound head than a basset hound does(?)

 

You can still get back to breeding true, and even then the bassets looked like bassets after a few generations. They thought of it as perfectly normal when a responsible show breeder is breeding for the breed standard. Today they'd be called makers of designer dogs. The kennel club in the UK supports this type of breeding for certain breeds- scroll down to 'limiting the decline of genetic diversity'. As far as I'm aware the American Kennel Club doesn't have these programmes, but I don't know.

 

 

The breed could, indeed, evolve to become something different but what's interesting is that with less selection pressure from shows the breed will sometimes remain more like the original. A pit bull looks a lot more like an old bulldog than a modern bulldog does. You get more mixture of the genes of that general 'breed' (combined with some occasional admixture from others) which prevents one gene from dominating.

 

You can also get landraces rather than breeds. Even then breeds predate the AKC, and predate strict closed registries, and the concept of a breed didn't originally mean that every ancestor of that dog was of the same type. The breeders might cross occasionally, or even regularly, but still select for the same traits and thus continue to get similar things in the long run.

 

Once you start closing off the gene pool, particularly if the gene pool is small, it's easier for a mutation to grab hold- especially if extremes start getting selected for (cocker spaniels and coat, bulldogs and pugs and flat faces.) This will happen less with working bred dogs because they're not selecting for those particular genes, but can still happen with diseases if the gene pool isn't large enough.

 

Edit: in some cases with rare breeds there are a lot of related dogs which could be used, but the registry's closed. Basenjis are basically a 'village dog' type and there's no shortage of those in their place of origin but they're a 'rare breed' in other countries. The appropriate village dogs look like basenjis (allowing for less selection pressure) but are much more genetically diverse.

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That's really interesting, thanks for the info. I didn't think about mutations, but it makes a ton of sense. It's interesting to see that the UK Kennel Club is doing the right thing to some extent. I wonder how much they actually do what they say they do.

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I was thinking more of what Chene was talking about (closed gene pools). If the blood of the original breed got diluted enough, then that breed wouldn't have any distinguishing features and therefore wouldn't be a breed. The AKC and organizations of the like (supposedly) store the breed standards.

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I think the AKC (or any organization like it) was trying to do the right thing by preserving the breed, and the shepherds were trying to do the right thing by preserving the spirit.

But we also have to consider how many breeds they have 'preserved' that would be extinct by now. This internal argument I'm having with myself is tearing me apart. The AKC may be in it for money, but they're also holding past breeds that would be lost without them.

I'm trying to get my mind around what you mean by this, and even what you mean by "breed" in the first sentence. Suppose no kennel club, including the AKC, had recognized the border collie. Do you think the breed would have been lost?

 

Can you name a couple of breeds that would have been lost without the AKC? How/why would they have been lost? How did AKC recognition preserve them? What was it, exactly, that was preserved?

 

For example, the AKC recognizes the Belgian Sheep Dog, the Malinois and the Tervuren as three separate breeds, whereas in Europe they are considered a single breed with a single standard. Is it a good thing that the AKC has "preserved" three separate variations as breeds, setting a different appearance standard for each, or is it a bad thing that they have prevented interbreeding among the three, thus reducing genetic diversity in each "breed"?

 

Don't mean to bombard you with questions -- I'm just interested in understanding your POV.

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Sure! I don't mind! I was thinking about breeds more in the non-sporting group of the AKC.

 

Take the Norwegian Lundehund. Quoting the official AKC website:

 

The Lundehund originated on the remote islands of arctic Norway, where it was used to wrestle and retrieve live Puffin birds (a meat and feather crop for the Norwegian farmer) from the crevices of steep vertical cliffs. The breed has also been described in writings as far back as the 1500s. When the Puffin bird became a protected species in the 1800's, the dogs were no longer useful to the farmers and breed numbers dwindled. The breed was saved from near extinction after World War II through the friendship of two concerned Norwegians, but even today the numbers are limited.

 

Puffin hunting isn't really that popular of a sport, especially since puffins are now a protected species. According to the description, the breed (or at least the standard) was saved. This is what I meant by preserve. I have a large book with detailed standards for each breed, and they even include the personality traits that the average dog of that breed has.

 

Of course, Simba said (earlier post) people had purposely tried to alter the border collie breed standard and ended up making a great gap between 'brains' and 'beauty'. Prior to Simba posting this, I had no idea people tried to alter the standards, hence my idea of 'preserving'. If the Norwegian Lundhund was a more popular breed, and people tried to change the standard from what the breed was originally like, I'm sure there would be the same gap.

 

I hope this makes sense to you... I feel like I explained it in a rather unusual manner :P .

 

To answer your question about the three-way recognition, I think that preserving them as separate breeds is better. It allows for more detail in the standards (assuming the standards are accurate, a mistake on my part), but that's just me.

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For example, the AKC recognizes the Belgian Sheep Dog, the Malinois and the Tervuren as three separate breeds, whereas in Europe they are considered a single breed with a single standard. Is it a good thing that the AKC has "preserved" three separate variations as breeds, setting a different appearance standard for each, or is it a bad thing that they have prevented interbreeding among the three, thus reducing genetic diversity in each "breed"?

 

 

I'd love to hear your opinion on this, Eileen - and I assume you have an opinion, since you brought it up. To be honest I don't see anything wrong with "preserving" them as three separate breeds, per se, but maybe I am missing some crucial bit of info on it.

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To answer your question about the three-way recognition, I think that preserving them as separate breeds is better. It allows for more detail in the standards (assuming the standards are accurate, a mistake on my part), but that's just me.

 

According to this logic, border collies should be split into separate breeds. We'd have the black and white ones, the red and white ones -- would we allow tri-colors to remain in the breed for their base color or would they be separated, too? What do we do with all the other colors?

 

The primary difference between a Belgian malinois and a Belgian tervern where they originated is the length of coat. Should we separate border collies into rough coated and smooth coated breeds? Where do we put the curly coated ones?

 

The distinction of appearance standards is their artificiality. It has nothing to do with usefulness or any other practical application.

 

I've told this story here before, though I suspect you haven't seen it. I started out doing competitive obedience, which was the only game in town at the time, with my first border collie. Border collies had not yet been expropriated by the AKC. I was at a show and someone came up to me and said, "Oh, border collies are such nice dogs. It's too bad they don't have a standard." I proceeded to tell her that yes, we most certainly do have a standard, but it's one based on working ability, not they way they look.

 

Sadly, she couldn't get her head around the concept and walked away befuddled.

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Big closet. Rather unsanitary too. Still, at least we all have a social hobby. Can we include a barbecue?

 

 

The Kennel Club and the Irish Kennel Club seem to be doing some interbreeding largely to combat the effects of splitting breeds based purely on aesthetics- like the Irish setter example mentioned earlier. You'd wonder why they don't just let the two breeds merge again completely. I mean aside from the screaming fanbase, the pissed-off judges, the potential loss of people who show those breeds, and the sheer amount of harassment they'd get, what have they got to lose?

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