havenjm

Sounds like kennel cough to me. It certainly could be grass or a foreign body, but kennel cough is far more common. Kennel cough presents as if the dog is trying to hack something up. Given that he was recently immune compromised and in a place where a lot of dogs were present, it should be ruled out.

Not to sound rude, but I hate this kind of mind set. "Exercising herself" is nothing but laziness on the part of the owner. Particularly where BCs are concerned, there is almost no end to their physical stamina, and it's their mental energy that you need to exhaust. Sitting in a warm car, or on your coach, while your dog runs around digging holes and biting whitecaps does NOTHING to challenge her to grow mentally. If you're not engaging her, then she's teaching herself, and that rarely turns out well. Get out of the car, and engage your dog. If you're too sick to do that, she's better off in a crate where she's not getting into who knows what and teaching herself who knows what sort of behavior.

I think the most important thing in training is to remember that if something isn't working, do something else. I've seen trainers, some good ones, get into trouble because they get pigeon holed into a method. If you've trained more than one dog you'll know that different dogs have different needs and see things differently. If you try something a couple of times and things aren't working, don't keep trying the same thing with more intensity because it worked on your other dog(s) or because that's what your trainer told you to do. If your dog isn't seeing what you want her to, show it to her in a different way.

Hi Rebecca, For clarity here, are you driving or fetching in this scenario?

I'm in the far east part of MA. About an hour and a half east of Springfield.

Looking for sheepdog folks, particularly trainers or people willing to help a newbie, in the area of Massachusetts.

I am hoping to get a group together to brainstorm about ideas of ways to really work towards getting the akc to drop the BC as a recognized breed. Any ideas are welcome (and i mean any) so don't hold back.

Bill, I think you're right regarding a Wiston Cap reincarnate, but I still think his hips should be documented on film to determine appropriate bitches that he should be put to. I'm not saying that I agree completely with the ABCA breeding guidlines. I think that just as no dog is perfect, neither is any law. If I had it my way, all Border Collies would need to demonstrate a certain level of working ability to even be eligible for breeding. Then those who are proven eligible would be tested in order to avoid breeding like weeknesses, whether they are observable to the naked eye or not.

What good is it to preserve working ability if it is present in dogs that are born into a body that can't support a working lifestyle? I don't think you can simply disregard hip status on the whole like that. The best seaman is useless in a rotting dingy with no oars. There has to be a protocal based on balance. Working ability is the premier qualifier, but health needs to have a say in the proccess.

I want to agree with Bill that the working BC is well served by a hip structure that, through a certain degree of laxity, places less stress on the bone structure. The problem, it seems to me, is maintaining an appropriate amount of laxity due to the compounding nature of any genetic defect. If two dogs with perfect working (or slightly lax) hips are bred it seems very possible they will produce offspring that will have hips that are overly lax, and likely to develop CHD. Balancing an appropriate amount of deformity would appear an extremely difficult prospect. I think this is where xrays can be valuable. If you have xrays of two dogs that appear to have hips that border on being too lax, it might not be a good mating match. That isn't to say that they shouldn't be bred at all, but there might be a better mate for each of them. I think AK touched on an important part of this as well. If "sound" dogs are bred at a young age it's possible that, through youth and stoicism, they are able to conceal problems. The woman who introduced me to BCs did this very thing. She had a bitch who showed true talent at work, and the man who owned the sheep on which she worked the dog asked if he could put his stud to her. She was two and a half at the time of the breeding, and as sound as any dog. Now at four she can't work at all and can barely get up the stairs. The two pups that I saw from the litter were lame before they were a year old.

i think taking the breed into account when rating hips is essential. particularly in the case of the working BC where you can take a "let the hill decide" approach and likely achieve more positive results than you ever would breeding from ratings. the problem with other breeds is that there really aren't any "hills" to speak of that can demonstrate whether the hips are sound enough to do their job well. with the working BC, i think "the hill" is the best judge of soundness both of body and of mind.

Bill- I didn't mean to imply that any dog that produces a pup with HD should be taken from the gene pool. I wanted only to emphasize the point that breeders should be notified of health problems that are genetically linked. I know of people that feel uncomfortable appraoching a breeder about problems with a dog's health. If the breeder only knows of half or a third of health problems they are producing they may not realize they're producing unsound pups. Health issues should be discussed openly so that ignorance can be kept to a minimum. Duncan's case may not be the best example, but I think the breeder should still be informed of the situation.

Jennifer (and others), I'm sorry to hear about your and Duncan's situation. Outside of what AK and others have offered in terms of treatment, I would ask that you make sure that the breeder from whom you got the dog is aware of Duncan's situation. Hopefully if they're aware of the situation they will retire Duncan's parents as breeders and you can perhaps save others from the grief that you have suffered.

How feasible do you think it would be to organize sheepdog demonstrations or trials that mirror AKC events? The point being to juxtapose real working border collies and AKC border collies to highlight the differences in working ability between the two. And educate patrons about why those differences are there, and what conformation breeding does to the BC.

I am looking for consultants for a project to save the working Border Collie. If you you are dedicated to the Working BC please email havenjm@hotmail.com for further details. Thanks, Haven