About 3 yrs ago I was at one of my first trials as a spectator. I ended up in a conversation with a gentleman who had a R/W border collie,he said he would never get another red, nor a merle or an excessively white dog, the judges just didn't look at them the same. Another gentleman at the trial told me that in Scotland (where he was originally from) they used to cull the merle's because merle's can't herd (how long ago that was I have no idea). Very interesting conversation for someone who was very new to border collies and herding AND had a red merle border collie puppy (my boy is a rescue from Craigs List, he was found on the streets of Atlanta, GA as a 3 mo pup).
