Farm dog breeds

[NightingaleJen]

Do you happen to know if collies have a similar coat to Aussies? I know someone with an Aussie who doesn't bother my allergies and it would not be hard to test the rest of my family with her.

Honestly, I'm not sure—not long before we sold our last house, our neighbor brought an Aussie pup home, but we never really got to see him full-grown.

 

[NightingaleJen]

Collies are quite soft / sensitive dogs, especially nowadays that the breed is mostly a pet or show dog.

This is true—honestly, I think collies have always been tender-hearted and soft, or at least for the past century or so. We probably have been a bit luckier with Ben because he was, in fact, bred by a cattle/dairy farmer in West Virginia. My husband actually found the breeder—just your average farm folk, honestly, who needed dogs to help out on the farm. Ben's parents both had AKC papers, and he is a very handsome boy, but in no way a show dog (for one thing, his eyes are "too big" and very expressive, but the former is, I think, kind of a fault...but he's better-looking to me than the collies we see at the shows on television). That said, though they were all just farm-bred dogs, the breeders did have the litter tested for the vision problems that have plagued collies for decades, hip dysplasia (a good thing since Ben averages about 85 pounds, large even for a collie), and a couple of other things I can't remember any more.

They never were bred to be predator-killers or defeaters. A couple of times folks have come up to or treated me in a manner both Ben and my childhood collie, Lad, saw as aggressive, and both dogs have come to my defense, but I'm Their Person and a collie is more like a buffer—a chance for you to reorient yourself to fight or flee—than Big Defender. To be frank, he's nearly thirteen now, and we live in a rural wooded area where coyotes are a major problem, and I don't let him out of my sight when we're outside at dawn or dusk, much less at night. The 'yotes attacked a neighbor's two young but full-grown boxers a month ago and one of the boxers' future is still up in the air.

Somehow Schnauzers have gotten into the discussion. We've looked into Giant Schnauzers ourselves and I think they might make a really excellent farm dog—alas, they're very rare in our part of the country! Not sure about the allergy issue there, though.

Finally, stiletto is giving you superb advice about finding a trustworthy breeder—it's difficult, and as Ben gets older, I keep reminding Hubby how very blessed we were with him. He is kind of a once-in-a-lifetime dog. Townchicks is giving good advice, too.

Just because I've been bragging so much, here's our handsome boy. Beware: Rough collie coats collect burrs and seeds like nothing you've ever seen.

 

[townchicks]

@NightingaleJen ,Ben is a beautiful dog. Frankly, I'd rather have a farm bred collie than a show bred one anyway, as long as the breeder did due diligence on health issues, as yours did. On a collie, I'd also want a MDR1 mutation screening, but otherwise, they sound great. I agree, most collies are too soft for predator control, other than alarm barking (which they are very good at), but frankly most breeds that have not really been bred for livestock guarding can fall short in that department. It's too bad that GSD have been ruled out due to the allergies as they would be pretty good at taking all the boxes.

 

[NightingaleJen]

Ben thanks you, @townchicks. MDR1 is probably one of the other screenings. Obviously it has been a while!

It is a shame @pkarkos had to rule out GSDs.