Sheepdog Competitions and the Top Border Collies
The International Sheep Dog Society, the ISDS, is the one main
Border Collie institution in Britain. As many dogs end up being
exported from the UK and to many parts of the world, at some point
or another, most keen and interested Border Collie handlers will
eventually come across this society and their historic work in
supporting and progressing the Border Collie's great skills. This
can be easily seen through the registrations of some of the most
famous of sheepdogs.
When I started out working with Border Collies there were always
certain well known names that cropped up on the registration papers
of nearly all the dogs that I owned. Although these breeding lines
still exists in many of todays well bred Border Collies, they are
enough generations back that their dominance in the breed may not
appear as significant as they used to when looking through the
papers of 30 years ago. These well known and formidable dogs were
the likes of John Gilchrist's Spot, Jock Richardson's Wiston Cap,
John Thomas's Don and McTeir's Ben. There were many others as well,
but these were some of the names. They were dogs that had competed
with the best and had risen to the very top.
There were certainly a handful of exceptional dogs and before "a
well bred" Border Collie became so popular, these top class dogs
usually remained in a smaller number of hands. Today, world wide,
the pleasures of competing and handling a well bred working dog have
spread to a wide and diverse population and with this there is as
wide a use of moderately successful dogs. Rather than those few
dominant breeding lines, todays' registration papers cover a wide
expanse of the Border Collie world.
Sheepdog trials remain an important part of the Border Collie
world. Each year, and in many countries, championship trials are
held and certain handlers and dogs engrave a name for themselves as
contenders of great worth.
(Border
Collie training information)
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