ISDS Border Collie Database

Andrea Turner asked me if I could supply information on early Dutch Border Collies because she is writing a book called 'The Working Border Collie around the World'. This inspired me to look what I could find out about the places that Border Collies go, in my database with all ISDS registered Border Collies.

I started by recording for each dog the country where it was bred and where the first registered owner lived. Note that a dog might also be exported at a later age, but those exports are not taken into account here. The two figures in this article show the results grouped by country and decade and displayed as a percentage of the total number of pups, roughly 4000 to 6000 each year for the sixties and later. The vertical scale is logarithmic, otherwise the countries outside the UK would be invisible. The lower bound of 0.1% represents approximately 6 pups.

In the fifties the ISDS registration was almost 100% English. During the fifties and sixties the Irish increased registering with the ISDS and nowedays the Irish are stable at nearly 11%. Other countries only started in the seventies but are increasing ever since and are now responsible for almost 15% of the registrations.

The distribution of first owners shows a similar pattern. Apparently most of the dogs stay in the countries where they were bred. The English export only a few percent of their dogs. I can't believe that this will exhaust their supply of good dogs, as some assert.

The classical countries to which farmers from the UK emigrate(d), such as America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Africa, are almost absent in these pictures. Nowedays 1% of the ISDS pups is exported to the USA but registrations stay below 0.3%. During a short period in the thirties and fourties exports to the USA and Canada have been around 10% but in the fifties it dropped off to less than 1%.

It doesn't come as a surprise that the ISDS is popular in countries near England like Holland, Belgium and Germany. More remarkable is that France is nearly absent. Note that the tempory increase in owners in the seventies is due to France, not Germany. Also remarkable is the presence of Zwitserland, apparently the Border Collie is of good use in the Alps.

Some unique registrations and exports are worth mentioning. Four litters have been ISDS registered by people in South America, 2 litters from Columbia and 2 from Uruguay. The first litter in Columbia was out of Bett 103482 by Joe 77934, born 12 November 1979 and registered by Dr.H.M.Scott working at the British Embassy in Bogota: ISDS numbers 120745-9. Apparently he sold Bett to I.W.Skea in Bogota because the next year Skea registered a litter out of Bett 103482 by his Bob 78378. The other 2 South American litters were registered by A.H.de Garcialagos from Uruguay. The first litter with ISDS numbers 191515-9 was born 23 April 1990 out of Jess 154804 by Flash 137604, the second litter was 193683-8 born 19 December 1990 again out of Jess 154804 but now by Jim 133025.

And what would you think of exporting dogs to Ceylon (Fiona 26716 bred in 1962 by S.J.Butcher from Salop) or to the United Arab Emirates (Gemond Harvey 119359 bred in 1980 by Miss E.R.Stone from Suffolk) or to Hong Kong (Tumpa 154853 bred in 1985 by I.F.Gribben from Kent) or to the Bahamas (Wenndale Sky 251712 and Wenndale Souter 251713 bred in 2000 by R.E.Briggs from Lancaster). But most remarkable were 3 dogs that went to Bermuda: Foxhill Spot 160022, Calypso 207722, and Jess 251276. Wonder if they didn't get lost.