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Recent Battles
Queen Victoria
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Juicing The Sheep
09 April 2009 11:11 AM | No CommentsThe Journal of Queen Victoria Thursday, October 21, 1868 “Juicing the Sheep“ At a quarter to twelve I drove off with Louise and Leopold in the waggonette up to near the “Bush” (the residence of William Brown, the farmer) to see them “juice the sheep.”...
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Queen Victoria’s Border Collies
26 January 2009 4:40 AM | 18 CommentsFor well over a century the “Collie” name has been co-opted by show breeders who have created a monster whose face looks like a door stop with beady eyes set in triangular slits. These same people have co-opted the notion that Queen Victoria was deeply...
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Show Me the Collie
22 January 2009 3:38 AM | 1 CommentHaving established that Queen Victoria’s direct influence on the proliferation of the show Collie is insubstantial at best, let’s explore what impact the Monarchy may have, in fact, had on the culture of dogs during her reign. Five. If the show Collie owes more to...
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The Queen and the Collie
20 January 2009 2:57 AM | 2 CommentsThe old wisdom on the rise of the show Collie is that Queen Victoria met them on a trip to Scotland in the 1860s, became infatuated, acquired them, sponsored them in shows, bred them, and her abundant trend-setting prowess lead to their bountiful rise to...
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The Victorian Collie Myth
19 January 2009 8:03 PM | 3 CommentsThe prevailing creation myth among show Collie enthusiasts is that Queen Victoria’s infatuation with the breed set the ball in motion, elevating the humble farm dog to aristocratic splendor. Queen Victoria saw her first Collies in the 1860′s, and she enthusiastically began to sponsor them,...
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Juicing The Sheep
sheeple Archive
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Still the Same after 70 Years
Posted on December 18, 2008 | No CommentsAlfred Eisenstaedt, the LIFE photographer famous for his V-J day photo of a sailor kissing a nurse, captured a Border Collie at work on a Connecticut farm in 1940, five years before he took his most famous shot.While these shots aren’t as romantic as the... -
These Dogs Count Sheep!
Posted on December 16, 2008 | No CommentsFrom Popular Mechanics, September 1947 These Dogs Count Sheep! Dewey Jontz’ piercing whistle drops Tess instantly no matter what she’s doing. He uses spoken commands, too, in ordering his canine “hired hand” to help with the chores. During field test the dog must drive a... -
Too Many Working Dogs, Too Little Work
Posted on December 4, 2008 | 12 CommentsFrom Donald McCaig’s The Dog Wars, you’d swear that there were too few working dogs and too much work to do, thus the dire need to “save” the entire breed (all 35,000 new puppies per year) to preserve the working ability only. But it’s not... -
A Dying Breed
Posted on December 3, 2008 | No CommentsDublin has always loved the Frisbee, originally uploaded by AstraeanBorderCollies. It’s easy for a young man like myself to surmise that sheep trialers are on whole an aged, if not aging breed. Their ranks are filled with people my parent’s age and older, the best... -
A Breed Apart II
Posted on September 18, 2008 | 5 CommentsThe culmination of the previous post is this statement: Our phylogenetic, clustering, and principal components analyses all suggest a genetic split within the breed between working and show Border Collies that is probably as large as the genetic distances between some breeds. Is this true?... -
A Breed Apart I
Posted on September 18, 2008 | 2 CommentsThose of us in Border Collies have long known that they’re in a class by themselves in the arenas of intelligence, agility, drive, and trainability. They’re different than other dogs and that difference is often wide. And we know that the difference is in their... -
Barbie Collies Can Herd, Really
Posted on January 4, 2008 | 9 Commentsreprinted, slightly revised (anonymized) from orignal post 9/14/07 ** Some Names and Images Changed to Protect the Innocent ** The end is nigh. The apocalypse is upon is. Pigs are flying and they are playing hockey in hell. A “barbie” collie won a USBCHA Open... -
Sheeple Admit They’re Hobbyists
Posted on November 23, 2007 | 1 CommentWed Aug 22, 2007 12:15 am But on the serious side of all af this, if mr kensmuir will allow, my take on all of this point earning, title seeking, usbcha presidential wantings,akc titles, best cowdog, greatest stockman, novice ribbons earning, sheepdogs are the best,... -
Too many working dogs, too little work
Posted on November 23, 2007 | No CommentsFrom Donald McCaig’s The Dog Wars, you’d swear that there were too few working dogs and too much work to do, thus the dire need to “save” the entire breed (all 35,000 new puppies per year) to preserve the working ability only. But it’s not... -
McCaig Visits Border Wars
Posted on November 23, 2007 | No CommentsDonald McCaig paid Border Wars a visit recently, but he left his comment on my very first post where no one is likely to read it. So here it is: donald mccaig said… Dear Readers,While I am disinclined to respond to adverse reviews (I had...
Queen Victoria's Border Collies