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Is she a border collie?


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Hello! My name is Anna and I am new to this forum. I just adopted Lady from the shelter. Her story is rather sad. Her elderly owners couldn't take care of themselves let alone their dogs. They couldn't get up to let the dogs outside to go to the bathroom and the house was not kept well. Eventually their children put them in a nursing home and took their dogs to the shelter.

 

The shelter said she was a border collie but she's so small that I'm wondering if she's mixed with something. I don't really care if she is, I'm just curious. ^_^ She is around 20 pounds and very small boned. She is just slightly smaller than my English cocker spaniel if that helps.

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Border Collies do come that small,and I don't see anything that definitely says this is not pure BC, but I wouldn't have been surprised if you had told me she was part Sheltie or Corgi either. Since there is nothing glaring, I vote 100% BC, until proven otherwise.

 

BTW, hello and welcome!

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Thank you for the quick responses! She's a wonderful dog. We're working on her potty habits but she's smart so I think she'll pick it up pretty quickly. She's very polite with my other dog, an 8 year old English cocker. She's only 2, by the way. I'm looking forward to a nice long life with her.

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Curious what shelter she came out of. There was a hoarder where I used to live that had Border Collies and Shelties. Her mixed breed pups often looked like smaller, purebred BCs. She sold pups to anyone with cash, so many landed in area shelters when their unprepared new owners dumped them.

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Is there any way to tell if she might be a sheltie? Like, is there something distinctive to look for? When I was a child my step sister had a border collie and we lived out in the country. He was such a fun loving goofy dog. He was much bigger than Lady and his muzzle wasn't as...shall we say 'pointy', it was more square.

 

Thank you all for the help! Lady is visiting the vet on Monday to get a check up and I'm going to talk to him about a skin condition she seems to have developed. She's very itchy in her rump area and has lost a very small amount of fur, the skin looks red. We'll get that cleared up! I'm also contractually obligated to get her spayed, but I would even if I wasn't, so I need to talk to the vet about that too. I'm hoping she was never used for breeding. The other dog at the house she came from was an elderly Pomeranian who had also never been spayed.

 

She loves being outside. I don't think she got to be outside very much in her old home because she treats every tree and pole like the most amazing thing ever. She just runs and runs and frolics to her hearts content.

 

My heart-dog Carlin passed away not long ago and bringing Lady home has really helped me heal while doing something good. I think Carlin would be proud that I adopted another dog to give a good home to like I did him. He was very sadly a bait dog and had a lot of scars but I've never met a dog with a bigger capacity to love. I hate what humans can do to man's best friend.

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With most flea meds, the flea has to bite to get the poison and be killed. For dogs who are allergic to flea bites, this means they will still get bitten and still react. Some of the topicals claim to repel, but if that is the case, it probably isn't 100% effective, which means the occasional flea still could get through and bite.

 

Impacted anal glands can also cause a dog to chew around their rear ends.

 

J.

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She is absolutely beautiful!

 

I think she's part Sheltie, looking at that delicate face. I am no expert at all, my girl is a mix als (probably). Most people think she has a bit of heeler; but her every little action is BC, from what every trainer we've had has told us.

 

Get her in agility and ROCK the 12 inch jump height! :D

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She looks like the dog my daughter started agility with although hers was mostly black. She could have passed for a BC x Sheltie but as Shelties aren't very common here the chances of that are pretty small. There was a bit of something else other than BC in there but we never knew what.

 

She was finer than the average BC, more square and less flexible but she spent most of her agility career jumping 30in jumps and only retired at the age of 12 because of failing hearing and eyesight. Otherwise she only started to deteriorate physically after she retired but still lived to 16 after a lifetime suffering from EPI

 

We always said we would know when it was time to retire her when she started knocking poles but she never got to that point.

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As someone who has had several shelties, I would not have blinked if you'd said she was a purebred bi-black sheltie. She looks a lot like my second sheltie save the color. She wasn't show bred so was a bit less....poofy and pointy nosed? lol

 

She was a good, good dog. A total spitfire.

 

My shelties weren't even bi-black and I got asked about my mini collies and border collies quite often (weird people seemed to guess BC). I know people with bi-black shelties and they get called border collies all the time.

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