Breeding the smooth collie as a show dog has made it significantly dumber than the working collie from which it descends.
A report just came out of Stockholm University. The author, Kenth Svartberg, writes that a study of purebred dogs finds that dogs specifically bred for the show have significantly reduced working ability when compared to dogs that have been bred for working ability.
The Telegraph, of course, uses the words “intelligence” and “stupidity.” I’ll use them only with this caveat: we don’t understand intelligence in our own species, so how do we think we can divine the intelligence of an animal? This is a nebulous term, which explains why most ethologists and psychologists avoid using the term. The authors merely are looking at sociability and curiosity as traits to determine intelligence.
However, the Swedish researchers explored 13,000 dog in 31 breeds, dividing them into those that were bred for appearance and those that had been bred for function (at least to a certain extent.) They were comparing the breeds based upon curiosity and sociability, which are all important traits for any working dog.
Those dogs that were bred for the show had much lower levels of curiosity and sociability. Both of these traits are associated with our projection of canine intelligence.
The author of the study thinks that there might be a genetic linkage between breeding for the show and higher levels of fear and introversion. That sounds interesting. It has to be a bit more complex than that, though, because there are lots of genes that make a dog “pretty.” And what makes one breed pretty is pretty unique to that dog.
The two breeds with the lowest levels of sociability and curiosity are the Rhodesian Ridgeback and the Smooth collie, which is a separate breed in the UK and the FCI countries.
I don’t know how one would compare these dogs to their working forms, because I don’t know if anyone hunts lions with ridgebacks. I’ve never seen a show smooth collie herd anything, and if it did, I’m sure it wouldn’t be as useful as a BC or an English or Australian shepherd.
The comparison study I’d like to see is a comparison of field line goldens versus the European show lines. I’m sure there will be vast differences between the two. My experience tells me that the two might as well be regarded as separate breeds.
Update:
Psychology Today’s blog has some issues with the sensationalized story that appeared in The Telegraph.
Have you been able to locate the study or an abstract? Everything seems to link back to the Telegraph article, which is poorly written.
“But a significant change in breeding trends has meant the ancestors of these proud working dogs are now less responsive to commands and not as alert or attentive.”
Doesn’t the reporter mean descendants?
You might want to look through a 2003 dissertation by the author of the study, where he classifies Flat-coated Retrievers high in aggression, along with AmStaffs, Boxers & Labs, but doesn’t define aggression. In another table, “retrievers” are rated very low on agression (!?)
Yeah, I know.
It seems weird that they are trying to compare working dogs to their show variants. What is the working form of the Rhodesian Ridgeback? Most smooth collies don’t herd, either. If you compared a smooth collie to a smooth-coated BC, you’d have very interesting assessment. I don’t know whether it would be valid, but it would be interesting.
A large number kf Smooth Collies do, in fact, herd. I find the report highly questionable, with no basis on fact. I have owned Collkies since 1969, and added Smooth Collies in 1981. These are HIGHLY intelligent, sociable, versatile dogs which can be BOTH a companion as well as a working dog! I am so tired of the rigamarolle and lies foisted upon the Collie. Yes, you do NOT wnat to breed for just one thing alone -p- in this case you mention the show ring. But, in an intelligent breeding program you never want to focus on any one attribute to the exclusion of all the rest! And, if you think it is easy to breed a great all around dog, try establishing and maintained a good breeding program. It can be done, but takes discipline, diligence, etc. When I was breeding, I bred for “good, sound structure and conformation, intelligence, good genetic health, and trainability.” The dogs I started with had this, and more! If you want to know more about the Collie instead of just carrying on the myth that they are “dumb”, lack trainability and all-around know-how, read my book, A Celebration of the Working Collie.
I saw one study of out that same university that said that flat-coats and Labs were the boldest of all dog breeds. I don’t think that word is translated correctly.
The Telegraph is not known for its great writing.
Plus it sensationalizes the words “intelligence” and “stupidity.” Those words are next to meaningless when we’re talking about dogs.
The “data” in studies can be fabricated and altered according to the mind-pset and goals of the so-called researcher. Now, if they said that Labs were, by and far, one of the dumbest dog breeds, I would say Wow, that is spot on!!
I think he’s misusing the word aggressive for the word bold.
It’s likely that his dissertation committee had members on it that were using different terms in English and Swedish.
Forgot to add the link —
Here are three links referring to earlier work by Dr. S.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6W9W-4DPYJ2J-4&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=291ca975f6d15691fccfb9aa3175d252
http://www.slate.com/id/2208111/
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=980DE4DD1030F93AA2575BC0A9659C8B63&sec=health&spon=&pagewanted=all
What about the assertion that ‘performance’ is about 35% genetic and 65% nurture? Don’t know where those numbers come from but I did read them recently. Were all the dogs in this study raised in identical circumstances? Do show people and working people raise their puppies in different environments? Would those environments have an effect on the final disposition of the dogs? I’ve been reading things on ScienceBlogs lately about disadvantaged children doing better in school if they are given enriched environments, might the same be true for dogs?
Nurture has a LOT to do with the ability of the adult dog. Dogs, like kids, need to learn how to learn. They may be naturally bright, but if they don’t have a foundation in how to learn, it takes a lot longer for them to catch on to new tasks.
In my first litter, we did lots of work exposing the puppies to new things. Surfaces, sounds, smells, etc. We did the Early Neurological Simulation program
http://www.breedingbetterdogs.com/achiever.html
We also had the pups on feathers and bird wings before they were out of the whelping box.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pskorupa/130958150/ &
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pskorupa/131634661/ &
Several of the pups went to active pet homes and were not on birds from eight weeks on. Over a year later, one of those dogs and his pet home owners decided to start training for field events (we had continued to train our boy from the litter for field work) The learning curve for the new field prospect was interesting to watch. Because he had the desire and the early introduction to birds, he was very enthusiastic. But he had to overcome a lot. For several months, he had to learn how to learn. Now (about 1 1l2 years later, he’s half way to a senior hunter title.
We used the that very program. We always handled our puppies, too, just to make sure they were well-socialized with people. Your dog is getting a chance to reach his full genetic and behavioral potential. I wish more people would appreciate those things in their dogs. I’m one of those people who likes dogs as dogs, not projections of furry people.
But if you got a golden with no retrieving instinct, and even force breaking doesn’t work, would you breed from it?
The retrieving instinct is kind of interesting how it develops. I’ve had them as young as 5 weeks do a full retrieve (not from the water by any means, just bring back a toy.) Typically, this behavior manifests itself by 4 months to 3 years (those late bloomers).
Have you seen the studies on how good dogs are at observational learning from other dogs? Apparently, they are better than scientists thought.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/863122
http://books.google.com/books?id=gbZXYnE2KlgC&pg=PA227&lpg=PA227&dq=dog+observational+learning&source=web&ots=kLLPH6HFRg&sig=3iD3sMhPWqtygCOXbhnkD1plzyI&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=6&ct=result
I usually don’t like all of Stanley Coren’s stuff, but I found this interesting. He had a flat-coat named Odin who died of osteosarcoma. He now has an Nova Scotia Duck Toller.
Stanley Coren’s dog was Can Ch Parkburn Odin, By Can Ch Parkburn Merlin x Can Ch Lathkill Cantata for Torwood (UK). He can be seen on a “Breed All About It” episode on flatcoats.
My goal is to produce dogs that can do the work. I’ve only bred dogs that hunt to bitches that hunt or have proven that they can at least do junior hunter level work along with other performance work. If I owned a dog that was completely uninterested in birds, I wouldn’t breed it. But I’m not that into the conformation game. We hunt over our dogs.
The one girl I have that was completely uninterested in ducks, and too soft to be forced to ducks was spayed without being bred. She would have been an awesome pigeon dog. But I didn’t think it was worth putting her through a hard force program. She would have been an uninterested and unhappy gundog. She turned out to be an awesome agility dog, though…
I’m not against conformation breeding. I’m just against it if it’s based on reasons that make no sense in regard to the health and working ability of the dogs. I’ve seen a few flat-coats that, unlike show goldens, have no bone at all and have really narrow heads.
My current dog is spayed right now. She retrieves. She’s biddable. She’s not gun shy. But she’s scared of virtually everything else. I’m not in the position in my life to breed dogs right now, although I’d love to get into it again at some point.
I’ve seen that very show on Animal Planet. I had no idea Odin was a show champion. In all of Coren’s writings about him, that dog is described as being primarily a sport dog for obedience and tracking. I like some of Coren’s works, but I think The Intelligence of Dogs, where they ranked the breeds in a “doggy Bell Curve” based on only obedience ability, was a bit much.
I don’t know why he got an Nova Scotia decoy dog (why don’t they just call them that? I hate saying that full name). It’s a bit different from any of the other retrievers, because it’s not exactly from the same stock. It’s got flat-coat in its background, Irish setter, and St. John’s water dog with a touch of collie. It would be a golden retriever, but its main base is a collie type dog called an English decoy dog (extinct, but I have a picture of one. It looks like a collie mix), which was used to bring in ducks in exactly the same manner. The Nova Scotia dog get a lot of genetic disorders, including collie eye.
I do not give ANY credence to Coren’s work published as The Intelligence of Dogs. When he rated the breeds, in a personal e-mail he stated that all he did was send a survey to approx 250 obedience trial judges to get their opinion. Highly flawed, subjective results. Now, if someone were to actually define intelligence and detal their methodology in a scientific protocol and attempt to reduce the variables as much as possible to make it statisticaly relevant, then I might consider this type of research as worth the paper it is printed on.
Conformation is important. A dog with incorrect structure, can’t do the work for which it is bred. And type is also important, in that a flatcoat should look like a flatcoat, and a standard poodle should look like a standard poodle.
Unfortunately, there are extremes in every breed.
Most flatcoats that are bred have a championship or are just lacking a point or major. It’s harder to put a CH on a golden, and nearly impossible to put one on a golden with field ability.
I’ll send you a few links for NSDTR photos We’ve trained with a few.
Are Nova Scotia dogs more collie-like in temperament?
I was told a few years ago the best sporting dog to put a CH on was a Field Spaniel, because they are so uncommon.
The Tollers I’ve been around are wild-children. Not at all like collies.
Forcing can shut them down, but they’ve got lots of drive and are very birdy.
The problem with putting championships on uncommon breeds is that you have to get enough of them together to make majors.
In order to earn the title of Champion, a dog has to earn fifteen points. Points are earned by beating dogs in the regular classes (dogs and bitches are shown separately, and points are earned by one dog and one bitch from the classes.) The number of points earned at a show is dependent on the number of class dogs (and class bitches) that are shown in the breed that day.
Dogs (& bitches) can earn from one to five points, depending on the number of competitors. In order to become a champion, the dog (or bitch) has to earn at least two majors. That is, they have to twice earn points where the entry is large enough to be worth three, four or five points.
That was the other part of it: there are enough field spaniels around to get points, because they are all being shown right now. But there aren’t enough of them to make it a difficult progject. If I showed my goldens, they’d just be point dogs for the big blonds.
That golden “Finn” is a Zelstone throwback, as are most current show goldens, except that he can do the work. Zelstone was a fine worker, just many of his descendants weren’t. Did you know that Zelstone’s sone, Tracer, was a major founder of the Tweedmouth strain?
I don’t own smooth Collies, however I’ve seen many Collies (rough & smooth) that are show dogs perform amazingly well in herding instinct and competitive herding trials. Certainly those they are trained to herd from puppyhood will perform better than those that have not (just as with hunting dogs, guide dogs, tracking dogs, etc.), however I’ve seen many Collies that have never seen a sheep or duck before, jump into a herding instinct ring and perform just as they were bred to for generations.
Show dogs are useless as true competitive working dogs. Collies are a good example. They are not competitive with border collies, and to say otherwise is stretching it a bit. The vast majority of borzoi-nosed collies, and (I’ve had these dogs growing up, so I know what I’m talking about,) have no herding instinct at all. Most English shepherds and BC’s do have this, and English shepherds are loose-eyed.
Check out this to see what the original collie looked like: http://borderwars.blogspot.com/2009/01/queen-victorias-border-collies.html
The show breeders ruined this dog.
Show dogs are always inferior to those bred for work, because those bred for work are bred for work (it’s a true tautology). Show dogs are bred for other things, with working ability being a vast second.
The original collie looked and behaved nothing like a borzoi-nosed lassie. If you brought one of those to a crofter in the highlands, he’d shoot it first.
They simply aren’t a competitive herding breed, unlike the BC. However, the BC is strong-eyed. It claps, and the small crofter really has no use for it.
The original collie then was more like an English shepherd, a loose-eyed, multipurpose farm dog. In Britain, only one strain of working collie has those characteristics, the Welsh collie or Welsh sheepdog: http://www.welsh-sheepdogs.co.uk/
I’ve seen many show collies that were so dull they didn’t like to move, and I can say the same for show golden retrievers, especially of British lines.
BTW, you’re the first person who has come on here to defend show dogs as being anything useful or even suggest that they might be able to compete with performance bred dogs. They can’t. End of story.
Again, breeding with a focus on just one thing is highly detrimental to any breeding program INCLUDING those who say they breed for work! You can and DO have highly flawed temperaments/dispositions (timid, aggressive, OCD as most ALL Border Collies are, a dog that doesn’t have the sense to take a break before it kills itself with heat stroke, etc.), structural issues (hip dysplasia, cow hocks, structure issues which can lead to early breakdown, lack of endurance, etc.), health (eye problems, for example), and so on. You can hardly recognize A LOT of Border Collies, now! You can no longer say that they are only bred to a working standard. In Australia and New Zealand, England and the US they are being bred more and more frequently as a “conformation only” dog; this started in the UK in the 1970s! And, allegedly in Australia in the early 1900s. The breed is evolving fast. The negative changes made to the Scotch Collie (Rough and Smooth Collie) happened in some lines, but the breed has recovered. Most ALL Scotch Collies are GREAT dogs! They didn’t get to be #1 because they weren’t. BUT, IF YOU DO YOUR HOMEWORK YOU WILL KNOW THAT HIGHLY POPULAR BREEDS PAY A PRICE. IT CAN HURT A BREED, AND IT CAN TAKE DECADES TO REPAIR THE DAMAGE DONE BY IGNORANT PEOPLE WHO JUMP ON THE BANDWAGON TO BREED JUST ANY DOG. NOT AL DOGS SHOULD BE BRED, AND FRANKLY NOT JUST ANYONE SHOULD BREED DOGS. The dog hobby/business seems to have more than it’s fair share of overnight experts from Joe Blow down the block, to farmer Brown, to some misguided show person. On one hand, you have what we could now call “field-bred” Border Collies who do not have an off switch. A dog that I would not trust around children, and who has so many issues if not worked because the breed as a whole has OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder). They are just too, too much for most people to want to live with. I want an easy-to-live-with breed, not some psycho. Researchers should select the BC as a research model to test some of the bi-polar/OCD drugs on. In that way, perhaps they can help people with the research, as well as the dogs by being able to provide pharma treatments. And, above all, BC people need to breed out OCD. It is a genetic flaw, and sould not be perpetuated. Look what they have done but breed an animal that if human people would say it had a mental disorder.
Wisconsin,
A Herding Instinct Test is a JOKE. I’m serious. JOKE. It’s such a joke that my herding trainer who judges AKC trials and is a top competitor in USBCHA trials (the real thing) warned me off putting those “titles” on my Border Collies to not be ridiculed by other herding sport people.
Any Border Collie who knows the command “sit” or “down” should be able to pass a HIT at less than one years old. I’ve taken all my dogs to this trainer at 6 months and they all accomplished the equivalent of an HIT on their first tries, first time seeing sheep, with no training except for “down.”
For one thing, 99% of the working Border Collie folks consider the AKCs ACTUAL trials (not the instinct tests) to be inadequate and unimpressive. Frankly they are, especially compared to USBCHA/ISDS trial. There really isn’t a comparison.
But even an AKC Trial is worlds beyond an instinct test. The HIT is literally a certificate that says your dog moved toward the sheep at some point during the exercise. It’s a test that doesn’t say anything about your dog by a pass. A fail says that your dog is pretty much hopeless.
Please don’t use a “herding instinct test” as any sort of evaluation or proof of ability. When an instructor who I give money to to train my dogs, who makes a good part of her living judging trials under the various organizations refuses to take my money to “test” my dogs officially during an AKC herding day, because she is sure that it’d be a stigma that I’d even do that with my two Border Collies (at the time), it tells me that it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on.
If you’d like an honest man’s opinion of AKC trials, full on trials, you can pick up Donald McCaig’s “The Dog Wars” or read my blog about his book. I have two long posts.
But the truth is, no other herding breed, in including the rough and smooth collie, has had a prayer at a real Trial since they came into fashion at the same time dog shows did. Even at the one and only trial that the KC put together, not a single rough collie won at any level. You can read about that on my blog as well.
In the entire history of trials in England and the UK, no other dog but a working bred Border Collie has won. In fact, we’re still waiting on the day when an American bred Border Collie wins the International. Even that hasn’t happened yet and we have some mighty fine dogs here.
And this distinction isn’t new. People were writing about the show bred collies being inferior at sheep work and stupid over a hundred years ago. Please tune in to my blog over the next week for some samples of this.
The herding instinct test is simply an introduction, a basic test to demonstrate whether the dog shows sustained interest.
“But even an AKC Trial is worlds beyond an instinct test. The HIT is literally a certificate that says your dog moved toward the sheep at some point during the exercise.:
By your statement above, you obvously don’t know what you’re talking about. Read the rules that were established by a credible organization such as the Bearded Collie Club of America back in the early 1980s. There is criteria that a dog must meet to pass. Do your homework.
The HIC test is a basic introduction to see if the dog demonstrates herding instinct. The tester nust be a qualified person with years of training and experience to be able to read the dog. Instinct is instinct, but not lal breeds work the same way.
At least these clubs have tried to test their dogs, and try to include herding instinct in their breeding program. Ideally, this introction would also whet the whistle of the owner and/or breeder who would then go on to locate a decent trainer who has experience working with all herding breeds, not just shallow tunnel vision. People are trying to ge back what our breeds have instinctively. What we have found is the vast majority of dogs have retained the instinct, and if given the opportunity will work stock. It will take a person with dedication to continue on to develop and get the best from that dog. And, as far as breeding we are adding more and more dogs who are from generations of working dogs which heklps to see what their style and power is, etc. HIC tests are only the beginning! Give these people credit for taking back the breeds!!! And, btw, quite a few Border Collies do not pass HIC tests. My experience with HIC tests are of those before the AKC got involved. If BC people don’t appfreciate the efforts of the AKC to try and include WORK and SPORT to keep the breeds active, alive, and conttribute to good health then they can always stick with USBCA gtrials and so on.
Cindy –
> credible organization
> Bearded Collie Club of America
LMFAO. What credibility do Bearded Collies as a breed, let alone the parent club of the show variety, have regarding herding? None!
Has a Beardie ever won a trial in the last 100 years? I doubt it.
The most attended and respected trial systems in the US and UK are open to _any breed_. A Beardie has never won or placed. In fact, you can register a Beardie with the ABCA if you can demonstrate ability, but I don’t think there are more than one or two breeders who are even giving that a try.
HIC isn’t being used to reach balance or maintain herding ability or even instinct. Nor is it being used to funnel show people into becoming working people. It’s a piece of paper that isn’t worth the pulp it’s printed on, designed to give show people an excuse to continue to do what they want to do while pretending that a few minutes of work and $20 will buy them some herding credibility.
I’ve seen people trying to train Beardies at both of the instructors I’ve gone to. It’s rather humorous. If I can find some old videos I took, I’ll post them, because my 4 week old half show bred BC puppy was a better herding dog than the show ruined Beardies who’d been training for years.
Before I saw Beardies, I always thought that the large green rakes the trainers kept on hand near the pens were for picking up sheep poop. Wrong! They’re for smacking the hell out of your stupid Beardie because it has no inbred sense of working at distance and not scattering the flock by breaking the flight distance.
The other thing I recall is that the Beardies just ran and ran in the same direction, didn’t take commands, and were exhausted after a minute or two.
> And, as far as breeding we are adding more and more dogs who are from generations of working dogs which heklps to see what their style and power is, etc. HIC tests are only the beginning! Give these people credit for taking back the breeds!!!
Bravo. I think breeding well is more important than breeding for some goal like working ability or conformation. Simply put, when people decide to hack and slash at the gene pool, despite lofty intentions, they create more unintended mess than they supposedly achieve with conformity.
Bringing back in blood that hasn’t been used in rigid programs will prove beneficial for more than just adding working ability.
“In the entire history of trials in England and the UK, no other dog but a working bred Border Collie has won.” Incorrect. IN THE EARLY YEARS, both Bearded Collies, “working sheepdogs” (I know, I know — supposedly unregistered Border Collies — however the melting pot can have Beardie or Scotch Collie {Rough and Smooth Collie} in there), and Scotch Collies such as Ch. Ormskirk Charlie, and others have won or placed in classes up until about the 1920s. Do your homework, and keep an open-mind. Those early loose-eyed, upstanding herding Collies were Scotch Collies. Border Collies demonstrate “eye” and use the stalking, low-to-the ground stance. BTW BCs contain Beardie blood, Rough and Smooth Collie (where do you think Smooth Border Collies come from?!), Whippet, and English Sprin ger Spaniel oftentimes undocuemnted but there just the same.
There is one rumored bearded collie in the BC pool right from the foundation. This is from before pedigrees were kept, but I think one early dog, like ISDS 8 (or perhaps an unregistered parent of a very early dog) was listed as a full beardie or beardie cross. Not a huge influence, but still there in minute presence today.
There is one significant Beardie addition in recent history. Turnbull’s Blue.
More info here:
http://www.bordercollie.org/boards/index.php?showtopic=5911
Border Collies do not contain rough and smooth collie blood. Not because I think there’s some purity issue I want to hush up like fascist blood purists or something. Rather, those terms are more modern than the founding of any of the Collie breed or herding clubs and no pedigree link is found in either direction.
Specifically, you can’t name a single dog that exists in both the BC pedigree pool and any of the other collie pools.
I’m not saying they have no common ancestors, but trying to call those common ancestors rough or smooth collies is bogus. If anything it’s the rough and smooth collies which have diverged the greatest from the common collie root stock.
If you’re trying to say that the superior BCs are that way because they have some rough/smooth collie blood, I’d suggest that the opposite is the case. The r/s collies have veered off the path into mediocrity, and it’s the BCs distance from those collies, not their closeness, that makes them great.
Your contention that short haired BCs come from smooth collies is a joke. BCs maintain the most diversity in size, shape, coat color, and coat texture of any of the collie breeds. Even among dog breeds as a whole there are but a few that have more diversity. It’s silly to suggest that the BCs were given part of this diversity from a breed that has very little conformational diversity itself.
The mere fact that the show people insist on calling two different coat lengths different breeds speaks to this.
As for other blood such as spaniel, or pointer or setter or whippet, we have no documentation, it’s all speculation. Perhaps future DNA tests will shed some light on the issue, but again, nothing happened in the modern era since pedigrees have been kept.
So we’re left to wonder about things like if the BCs eye is from the same genes that give bird dogs their point, etc.
I just flew to California since my last post and I remembered that you are probably the same Wisconsin breeder that commented on my blog.
One of the things I’ve heard many times from Collie people is that “collies can herd, they even won the first sheep trials!” Ignore that this is a 100 year stale argument if it were true. But it’s not.
Not only is this a lie. The truth is pretty embarrassing. Here is a preview of one of my future posts. It’s a quote from the KC’s Collie Breed Historian:
“Having established themselves as Gundog Trial organisers, as well as a show promoting society, the Kennel Club made one tentative attempt to add Sheep Dog Trials to their list of achievements in 1876. The advertised event taking place at Alexandra Palace in the centre of London on 30th June, and although we are advised that many Show Collies were entered, all the prizes, including those for appearance were awarded to working collies from Wales.”
– Collies Through the Ages 1871-1880
So yeah, the first show collies not only couldn’t herd, they weren’t as pretty as the ruffian Border Collies from Wales. And that’s from a highly respected COLLIE person in England, it’s not some BC propaganda.
And I don’t really need to mention that while the most respected and serious working sheep dog competitions are open to any breed, papers or no, there hasn’t been a serious collie contender in recent memory, if ever.
Even in cattle trials, the BC is by far the most dominant dog. I’ve heard of some people trying their luck with Kelpies, but again, try, not succeed.
While it’s hard to say if the Collie was ever as good at the Border Collie, it’s certain that selective breeding has made the Border Collie smarter and the Collie dumber. The Border Collie more talented at herding, agility, and more biddable, and the Collie less able in all those fields.
I’ve gone to several herding instructors and seen other breeds learning. Most notably Rotties and Bearded Collies. Their handlers had put in years of training on their dogs and my puppy Border Collie could outwork their results on their first try.
One advanced trainer had spent an entire year with a rake and a broom flailing about trying to keep her beardie at a distance to the sheep and she was certain she was making good progress. With a little “wo” and some body language from me, even my half show bred Border Collie was not wearing the sheep and was easily controlled with only my body position.
While I’d be happy to delve in to Nature vs. Nurture with you, it is clear to me that the smarts, instinct, and talent are built in to the Border Collies. It’s simply up to us to not screw it up. True working trials are not “obedience on sheep” and this is a term that comes up often with the working folks when they watch AKC people. They say they don’t “work” they do “obedience” and it’s about as authentic as the difference between a dog doing a scene in a movie where it “obedience growls and obedience attacks” versus the work of a real police dog.
It’s only the same thing if you’re willing to suspend disbelief, edit out the bad parts, and do take after take to get it right.
If you read the words of the best handlers, they often say that the best dogs are not trained, they are born. They “train themselves,” you’ll hear often.
While it takes a human trainer and handler to navigate the point structure of a major trial (the dog certainly doesn’t know that someone is keeping score and that there are deductions for things that are of human concern and no concern to the dog), you can’t make gold from lead.
While collies may have never been as smart as some of the old time writers say, they are nothing special now. I don’t think they even break the top 15 in Stanley Coren’s list. For what that’s worth. While I don’t think it tests intelligence (Border Collies would still be #1 in almost any test you chose) I do think Coren’s method tested biddability vis-a-vis skill acquisition. For some dogs, this is not really a measure of their most important feature because they do not need fine control by humans. For instance, retrievers don’t need to be guided to the prey and skillfully manipulated around it. They need to find it and bring it back and not destroy it.
This is often done out of the presence of the human.
Border Collies are a precision animal and the test is of quick skill acquisition. Retrievers can be a precision animal too, and several of the top Obedience handlers in the country use Retrievers.
I certainly don’t see Rough or Smooth Collies trained to a high level in those competitions, or in any media, movies, or commercials.
I’ve met plenty of them and they all seem like normal dogs. They certainly don’t have that same spark that Border Collies do. And I’ve met plenty of people who lament the collies they had when growing up. They might have been in the process of ruination for over 100 years now, but it seems that the process is speeding up, not slowing down.
So please, revel all you want in the Collie’s “beauty” and hair and elongated faces and decorative ears. But don’t try and pretend that they have any connection to reality and work and herding other than sharing a name with a breed that still does. They certainly aren’t even “Collies” anymore. They’re not black, and they’re not useful. That rather does away with both origins of the name.
Very good analysis. “Precision animal” is very accurate. The border collie is the ultimate working dog. Border collies never cease to impress me. My favorite is the dog named Rico that responds to over 200 words.
Goldens do well at obedience and agility, but they aren’t the top field dog. That long hair, their tendency to naturally quarter like a setter, and their slow returns tends to hurt them when they are judged against an otter-haired Labrador, which don’t quarter as strongly as a golden. I mean there are some really good field goldens out there, but what they’re good at is really something that a springer could be used for– upland gamebird flushing.
Goldens are number four on Coren’s list, which is really a list of perceived biddability from obedience judges. When that book came out, one out of four obedience trial champions (or maybe it was one out of five, I can’t remember) were golden retrievers. Once the BC became part of the competition, those two breeds have dominanted the sport.
I will say that goldens are, if bred properly, the easiest retrievers to train as pets, although flat-coats are very similar. However, for field competition, the Lab is the breed that dominates. It’s sort of in between the golden and the Chesapeake in that it’s biddable like the golden and not easily cowed like the Chesapeake. It’s also had many more generations of selective breeding just for field trials, and that does have an effect.
I think nature has a lot to do with it. How can you train a dog to have the exact motor patterns of a retriever or border collie coupled with the right amount of drive? I don’t think you can train that. It has to be bred into them. I think this has something to do with people, although in dogs, because of selective breeding, the effects are more concentrated. I know of families that where the members rarely see each other, yet they all develop similar intelligences and abilities in work and school. There has to be some genetic relationship to it. It’s not all nuture. Nuture does help enhance inherited abilities, which is why some border collies just herd cats all day, and some golden retrievers become obsessed with tennis balls.
I could train a golden to herd sheep, but it would never beat a border collie. They both might be precision dogs, but they have different appitudes and predatory motor patterns. A border collie could be taught to retrieve, but I bet we’d have to work very hard on hard mouth (crunching the birds)– something you almost never have to do with a golden.
Collie comes from the Anglo-Saxon word “col” which can mean black– “collied night.” Hence, all collies were originally black.
The working Collies from Wales and Scotland were by and large Scotch Collies. Not Border Collies way back when. The winner of the first trial was a dog brought from Scotland by SE Shirley’s shepherd. The dog was a Scotch Collie (oftentimes referred to back then as Collie, cotch Collie, English Collie (not to be confused with English shepherd which is an American breed and a Collie descendant), Smooth sheepdog, English sheepdog (not to be confused with Old English sheepdog), Colley, Ban Dog, Cur Dog, Shepherd Dog or Dogge, and even working Collie. SE Shirley was the founder of The Kennel Club (Britain).
You don’t want to go toe to toe with me on Collie history and not bring your A game, Cindy.
Let me point you to a passage from http://www.collietree.info, which is an excellently researched site. The author of that site actually provided me with some first hand research from the Royal Archives regarding Queen Victoria’s dogs. This is from page 2 of “The Shirley Factor.”
[blockquote]Having established themselves as Gundog Trial organisers, as well as a show promoting society, the Kennel Club made one tentative attempt to add Sheep Dog Trials to their list of achievements in 1876.
The advertised event taking place at Alexandra Palace in the centre of London on 30th June, and although we are advised that many Show Collies were entered, all the prizes, including those for appearance were awarded to working collies from Wales.
Largely due to the damage caused by poorly supervised Welsh Mountain Sheep running amok in the Palace grounds, the event was never repeated, and since this date the organisation of sheepdog trials has been left in the hands of the agricultural community, making Collies the first casualty of the show/work divide[/blockquote]
I’ll also enlighten you to the fact that the Kennel Club’s abortive attempt was not the first sheep dog trial. Bala 1873 is often credited as such, but we do have evidence of even earlier local trials.
In any case, I’m not sure where you get the idea that Shirley or one of his dogs or “his shepherd” won any of those early trials with a show collie. At best Shirley was a co-promoter or associate of one of the hosts. I don’t see any evidence that he owned dogs or employed the winners of any of the trials, let alone the first.
And there’s certainly no evidence that any of these dogs were show dogs or have maintained progeny in the modern show collie of any sort.
I’m getting old, and so it is getting harder to bring my “A game.” But, you do get me fired up! Not feeling good at all today, so will try to address a few things point-for-point.
I don’t want to write a treatise, as that would take too much time and effort which is too valuable to me. Therefore, clusters or batches of information will have to do at least for now.
SE Shirley’s dog is said to have won the first trial a Bala.’
Collies continued on through the mid 1900s (1950s-1970s) to have both “show Collies” and “working or farm Collies.” You hardly ever see the split in type anymore. My first Collie Lad was of the old-fashioned farm Collie type. These dogs were STILL working on farms up to and including this period of time. Personally, I do prefer a much more moderate dog like this. Yes, I do feel they went too far PHYSICALLY with the Collie. He had it all — beauty, brains and working ability. Or, as I like to say, I’d like to have a t-shirt made up that says, “ALL THIS AND BRAINS, TOO!” :) I don’t think that Borzoi made it into all lines of Collies. I hate that some fool brought it in at all! I, too, think that it is grotesque. BUT, there have been and still are some very handsome Collies that may have dodged the bullet, so to speak. ALL Collies that I have owned have been extremely intelligent, highly trainable, biddable, fun to work with and be around, and such dogs have been the cause of me dedicating my life to them.
Dareen Bridges does a wonderful job on the Collie Tree site. She is one of the 3 authors of Rough Collies of Distinction.
Early sheepdog trials appear to have been quite unorganized to say the least. And so I’m not surprised (though naturally disappointed) when I research and read how dogs scattered sheep from here to there. The winners of the London trial are said to have been working Collies from Wales. That does not necessarily mean “Border Collies.” The blue Smooth Collie of that time was extremely common in Wales, and often referred to as Welsh or English working Collie or sheepdogs. As I mentioned, Scotch Collies (how I WISH we would get rid of the names Rough and Smooth Collie, and return to Scotch Collie — the UKC continued using our breed’s old name of Scotch Collie until recently). I wish that we had photos of those early working dogs. Without early photographs, one way that I try to differentiate between early Collies and Border Collies is by a description of their style of work. For example, Collies are loose-eyed and upstanding, whereas Borders clearly have “eye” and utilize the low-to-the-ground stalking reminiscent of a predator.
I have 2 rooms dedicated as libraries on canine studies. If I had the time and inclination, I can pull documentation to back my statements. Some statements are my own opinion usually backed by decades of research. Other statements are backed by the research directly. We must remember that even our sources (regardless of WHEN they were written) may have been subjective.
I know that Bala was not the first trial, though it is often credited as such.
Ch. Ormskirk Charlie as well as others were highly competiive dogs who were also excellent herding dogs. We have to differentiate dogs as practical working farm dogs as opposed to the staged herding trials. There is a difference. A dog such as Charlie did well in both situations!
Granted, most Collies are not actively out there herding sheep on a day-to-day basis. Most people do not own sheep, and this has been the case since the Industrial Revolution. BUT, when Collies are tested it is remarkable that the vast majority (typically, 70% and above pass quite well. it’s amazing to see an animal who has never seen sheep, and when introduced to stock the proverbial light bulb comes on and they proceed to work! I was a part of the development of the first Collie herding program initiated in 1983. We took great pains to develop a legitimate and credible herding program along with the Beardie club and the Terv club. We wanted to devise a system to retain, discern, maintain and then develop the herding abilities and skills of our Collies. hough the AKC program has its flaws, at least they are trying. Our herding instinct tests AND trials were a plan to turn things around. Over 1,000 Collies were tested, and some of the results laid out in my book, A Celebration of the Working Collie.
You appear to have some good though processes and some good information at hand. It’s apparent that you are committed to “the cause.” But, must you be so caustic? Must you trash other breeds as you support the BC? I know the BC is a good dog, but I feel that the breed has suffered at the hands of breeders/trialers who bred dogs with OCD that will work till they drop dead of heat exhaustion (please don’t attack me by demanding supporting data of x number of dogs that have died ad nauseum). Not everything has to be debated to the death. Why not provide a gentleman’s debate? Your stance would be much more accepted. I know of a lot of people who ignore your site and information now mainly because of 1) your caustic, in excess approach, and 2) That you will not allow for other opinions, and 3) you trash other very good breeds and 4) there can be several “right” answers.
The Scotch Collie has evolved over the years, keeping up with the demand as an outstanding companion animal. I feel that the Collie and Golden Retriever are probably the BEST choices as family dogs and as dogs for children. Good thing since there is not that much demand for a herding dog of the Border Collie’s calibre which peforms in an outstanding way at trials and on farms when utilized. The Border Collie is THE ultimate herding dog! But, the Scotch Collie is probably THE ultimate all-around farm, family, and service dog! I would have liked to have seen the herding skillset and capabilities of the Scotch Collie maintained and developed along with his other attributes. But, when they became popular as an all-around dog and family companion, that wasn’t the focus of the majority of breeders of thhe time — unfortunately.
Most farmers in my part of the country (Midwest) do not use herding dogs like the Border Collie. These are mostly the small landowners who may have a pet dog of many different breeds or of no breed in particular that serves several functions such as family pet/watch dog/and maybe some light herding of ducks or sheep, or one of the livestock guardian breeds for stock protection. They don’t seem to fully understand how valuable a good herding dog can be. A multi-talented useful farm dog does the job for the average farmer. Many just can’t see forking over large sums of money for a dog when tha money ha to go elsewhere to keep them afloat in these hard economic times.
> I was a part of the development of the first Collie herding program initiated in 1983.
Thank you for that. I’m sure it was a considerable amount of work, and the more options and opportunities there are to explore our dogs and their inbred traits the better.
> my book, A Celebration of the Working Collie
I’ll have to pick up a copy and see what you have to say. Congrats on getting published, I understand it’s a nearly impossible task.
> But, must you be so caustic?
Perhaps not, but decades and decades of made up histories and “common knowledge” don’t fall to platitudes.
> Must you trash other breeds as you support the BC?
Only by dissecting the past and present can we hope to guess at the future. Much of the debate in BCs is hypothetical about what will happen or what is happening, and the obvious place to look for confirming data is at other very similar breeds who have gone through splits and fads before and see what happened to them.
In specific to the Scotch Collie, I detest both the abundance of false history and in large part what the breed has become now, especially in form.
> I know the BC is a good dog, but I feel that the breed has suffered at the hands of breeders/trialers who bred dogs with OCD that will work till they drop dead of heat exhaustion (please don’t attack me by demanding supporting data of x number of dogs that have died ad nauseum)
What scares me about the BC is that the overwhelming moral high ground in the debate is “we breed for work and work doesn’t produce monsters!” yet the exact same stupid breeding decisions are made in the working community.
It’s very easy to pick apart show dogs for being inbred on things like too-small skulls or distorted morphology. What we assume are the intended results. But disease and dysfunction appear unintentionally all the time. No one wanted cancer in flat coats or rage on cockers.
You won’t find me making excuses for the working/trialing community for abusing popular sires as much or more than any of the ruined show breeds.
Unlike Goldens and Labs who have traded off the top spot at working trials, and will perhaps continue to do so in the future… not to mention that several breeds are still active participants, the same can’t be said of the herding family and the big time trials.
Frankly, the top Obedience Goldens could very well pass a HIT and even win a herding trial in the AKC system. It’s a small pen setup and there just aren’t nearly the same means of failing that a wide open trial situation offers. It’s just slightly more freedom than working livestock in shoots and pens, and that can be done by almost any dog as it’s not about control, it’s simply about pushing the herd through the pre-defined maze.
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In tracking down the collie name, I’ve come across two oft repeated explanations, one is as you say, “black.” The other is “useful,” although this is a bit harder to find repeated on non collie websites.
One that does mention it is:
http://www.gis.net/~shepdog/BC_Museum/Permanent/BCHistory/BC_History.html
Attributed to Iris Combe, who is an archivist and collie historian (now 95 and in a nursing home I hear). She actually compiled a good deal of information on Queen Victoria’s collies and the woman who now runs the “Collies Through the Ages” website inherited her compiled findings.
As I said before, I think the show collie currently fails to live up to its name.
The woman I got my Black Jack from almost 20 years ago was the top obedience handler in the country. Not that I knew anything about dog sport at the time. She’s still active in the sport to a lesser degree (much like other dog sports, it’s partially how good you and your dog are and partially about how much money you’re willing to spend to travel and cram in a lot of trials).
After meeting up with her and watching her work at the large Denver dog show, she pointed out the woman who is currently the top obedience handler and she uses Goldens. Very impressive. I asked why there were so few Border Collies in the competition and the gist of the answer was that Agility has peeled off many of the BC folks and that the calm precision of Obedience appeals to many other breeds and to handlers who can’t keep up with their dogs running around like fools (I do this) throwing out commands and hand signals. Obedience is decidedly less “fun” than Agility. But you can compete in Obedience by being a good handler, without being at all athletic yourself.
As much as I love being a BC elitist, seeing other dogs excel in dog sports, (there are several breeds which are great at Frisbee… obviously a mosaic of breeds at the top of Obedience and Rally, and even a good smattering of dogs who are tops in agility) makes me happy. It shows me that there can be a plethora of standards by which to assess our dogs. Smart and biddable is not just the realm of one breed or one test.
I agree with you– there are lots of biddable dogs out there.
The reason why I don’t have a BC is because I don’t have anything to herd. However, my neighbor does, but I don’t think she needs herding dog services. In fact, she’s very tolerant of dogs chasing her cows– even allowing the local magistrates German shepherd mix that looks like a coyote to chase her catttle. I’m not so willing to allow these liberties.
I live in the middle of nowhere (when I’m not in the city doing dissertationish stuf) where you don’t have to fence dogs in. They get to run around and socialize with other dogs.
I have just a single dog right, not of any kind of working ability. And the ruffed grouse population has dropped greatly, so I really can’t provide for a real working flushing retriever right now. My current dog is turning out to be a nice pet retriever– obedient and very good natured. However, she will only retrieve for a few minutes, so she’s definitely pet quality– and spayed. (She’s also approaching the large size of the retriever spectrum– something my vet warned me about when I got her. She’s not fat– just big.)
So although I love working dogs, I can’t provide for a real working dog right now. But that doesn’t mean I can’t be an advocate for them.
Sounds like you’re on the safer side of the spectrum. Better to have a dog who is satisfied and under-active than a dog that is not having its needs met.
People who are in a position to have too little dog are often in a position to do something about it. Having too much dog often overwhelms people and it’s worse for the dog and everything else involved.
And I’m not going to fall into the trap of every dog in such and such a breed need be a clone and need fit some arbitrary standard either. Better there are a plethora (double word score, used twice on same blog in 24 hours) of styles and aptitudes. Who knows, you just might find something special where you didn’t expect it.
It is said of many of the greatest border collies that they came out of dams who were otherwise undistinguished or sires that previously didn’t have a strong line of some valuable trait. We think we know everything and we think “only the best to the best” is the only strategy. I say that’s bunk.
Some greatness is in the genes for generations, some of it is nurture, and some of it is the combining of two traits which previously were under appreciated or had yet to come together.
Combine the ease of a phone with the mobility of a radio? Why do that? Hello cell phone. There are countless other examples.
In _The Ascent of Man_, J. Bronowski said, “A genius is a person with two great ideas.” And the product of genius comes from that person’s ability to merge them.
You can’t have two great ideas if all of your ideas are the same.
Although a bit late on, i think it’s time to set some things straight. Fact is, i wonder if the reporter on The Telegraph even bothered to read the study. It never mentions intelligence at all. The tests(not performed by Dr Svartberg, who apparently is not pleased with how his study, made 2006, has been interpreted) only showes characteristics like sociability, aggression and curiosity. I know this because i’ve not only read the study, i’ve taken my dog to one of these standardized test. And he didn’t come back with a dumb cap. :)
The same goes for marking out Smooth collie and Rhodesian Ridgeback as breeds particularly hard hit.
If you feel like actually reading the study, here it is: http://www.svartbergs.se/pdf/BreedPersonality.pdf
The Telegraph has terrible reporters.
I see lots of border collies on the campus grounds doing the frisbee and flyball thing……those guys are amazing. I can see how they would dominate in herding trials.
I’ve got one of Parkburn Odin’s pups! Parkburn Odin x Parkburn Promise. I showed Stanley Coren a picture of Shadow once and he said she looked a lot like her dad.
Frisbee and flyball doesn’t equate wirth intelligence; perhaps just a hyperactive animal with OCD and a need to retrieve to the 9th degree. Christopher was right in the intellugence is a nebulous thing to try and define, and there is no agreement in this nor how to do so.
As far as the study from Stockholm University, I’ll continue researching and take their study with a large grain of salt. HOWEVER, I do STRONGLY feel that no one has the business to breed dogs if it’s just for conformation, or just for work, or just for hunting, etc., etc. The WHOLE picture, the entire animal should be taken into account. **I’m a FIRM believer in the entire package.**
Actually Frisbee and Flyball do equate with intelligence. These are trained skills and success in training requires an intelligent animal. You can have fun arguing the degree of training rigor but that is more a matter of what you’re asking the animal to do and how much of it involves continual problem solving.
Most dogs can be taught to free stack and there’s rarely any instance where this is a moving target that would ever require the dog to think and process a lot in the ring, any ring, any show. But there are numerous variables out on the field that would reward the smart and thinking dog over just a well trained one.
Same with the trial field. I can easily think of examples of dogs that are successful because they are independent problem solvers of great skill and are allowed to work with little direction and there are people who have dogs that need constant direction and which do not naturally problem solve well.
I see more opportunities for independent thinking and training challenges in Frisbee than Flyball, more in that than in Dog Shows. There’s quite a bit of potential in Agility and of course in real work and working trials.
“just for work, or just for hunting, etc., etc. The WHOLE picture, the entire animal should be taken into account. **I’m a FIRM believer in the entire package.**”
This is actually the antithesis of breeding for competition.
VERY GOOD comment, Dentaku. :)
Interesting. Well I’m certainly not a fan of breeding dogs based solely on appearance! Too many breeders do breed for looks and don’t consider health and longevity. I personally don’t care if my rough collie can herd a flock of sheep, I’m an average person who just wants a canine companion, and there’s nothing wrong with that. I’ve had plenty dogs with 0 working drive but they were more intelligent than most people. Sometimes a dog with too much working drive is too much for an average person to handle. I believe show dog breeders should focus on breeding for health, temperament and longevity (no inbreeding) and working dog breeders obviously with the added drive and working ability. Just because a dog doesn’t work doesn’t mean he’s dumb. Intelligence is relative to the situation. They can’t make an acurate comparison to a show dog and working dog, they have different functions… It’s like saying, if you ask a fish to climb a tree, is he stupid?