There were two blind double merle Collies represented at Westminster this year but if you blinked you would have missed them. I don’t blame you, neither one was actually AT the event, but they were both there in spirit: one was only briefly mentioned as the sire of Best of Breed winning Wyndlair Cherokee Vindication, and the other flahsed on the screen during the Purina Pro Plan advertisement “Inside Every Good Dog is a Great Dog.”
You can read the entire saga of the Wyndlair blind double merle Collies in these posts, their story is now well known and documented:
The other blind double merle Collie is a bit of a mystery. His or Her story is not well known and I’m not sure there’s a way to find out. But it doesn’t matter. The other blind Collie didn’t win any awards yesterday and won’t be seen in Best of Show today. He hasn’t sired any litters and his owner won’t be paid exorbitant stud fees to pass along his dysfunction. No one will ever clap and cheer for this dog and it’s unlikely any of us will ever know his name. But this dog is special for one reason: someone out there actually cares more about the dog than what they can exploit it for. This dog is loved.
I don’t know who the woman in the video is, I don’t know her name or how she came to find this dog, or even if it’s really her dog. It could be a therapy dog going to visit a retirement home or it could be her companion of many years. But in the two seconds she and this dog appear on screen in the ad that ran twice during Westminster it is blindingly obvious that she cares more about this dog than anyone cared about Wyndlar Avalanche.
This double merle blind collie appears at the 0:45 mark in the Purina Pro Plan advertisement.
Watch the video and pay close attention around the 45 second mark:
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Rewind it a bit and watch that part again. The woman leans over, caresses the dog’s head with both hands and whispers in its ear. You can’t make out what she says, but I’d like to think it went something like this:
You are not blind, the people who created you are blind. They cannot see the damage they have done to you.
You are not deaf, your breeders are deaf. They cannot hear the words of reason asking them to stop.
You are not a monster. They are monsters, evil and unrepentant.
They tried to leave their mark on the breed, but they left only a stain upon you.
I’m sorry what they did to you, I’m sorry I stayed mum. I didn’t speak up yesterday, before this act was done. But this I pledge to you today: I will not compromise; I will not let them deafen you or hollow out your eyes. I will not waste tomorrow, I’ll learn from my mistakes. I’ll end their acts of savagery however long it takes.
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YES!!! And they had the nerve to pass this off as if this dog was some poor, unfortunate FLUKE who was loved despite his handicap, as all disabled people would like to be. They took advantage of the hearts of people, and worse, likely of those who have disabilities themselves!!!!!!!!
How much more despicable can that be???????
Urban Chick I with you. How much more despicable can people get. You see Great Minds write and talk about ideas. Those that come to this blog site seem to come to tear other people down because small minds talk about people. Some medium come to talk about things. This is where complexity of moral, principles and values clash. We who are here to learn because of our thirst for knowledge to not have heaven on earth but to reduce the pain, suffering not to create more. We all have had enough of seeing human, animal, birds, fish, trees, plants even snakes and alligators BUT especially our Dogs bring us here. Weary of the chat sites ..we want to learn better stewarship of our dogs.
What is wrong with you people? Check out “SINE in Phenotype in Dogs” and look at the list of minds like ours searching for knowledge to this same end. Now chris provides good guidepost in Academic Fraud to determine your choices to follow.
Chris sees what I see …his chosen breed is following the path to the Abtract version of conception of the Classical version of the American Collie. Stop this idle chatter that he believes his breed is better than yours. It makes you sound self centered and selfish which he is not. Do not see Dr. Jean Dodds here and she should take her rightful position as a pioneer.
I think Dr. Dodds is doing wonderful work. Forgive me but I read your post 5 times and had a hard time telling if you were agreeing with me or disagreeing.
Oh my gosh – that commercial is so sweet! I wonder what that dog’s story is.
The little wheelchair dog at :39 is “Lucy”:
Beautiful poem at the end Chris. Really tugs at my heartstrings.
I found a video of this collie on Youtube. His name is Jackson, and he’s a therapy dog.
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Well gosh, there goes my idea that we’d never know who that dog was. Wonderful find!
Jackson is Best in Breed in my book.
Yes, Chris when I saw the photo in the grocery store nearly made me forget and buy a bag.
Jackson is awesome! It’s the folks who made him blind that are evil.
Awesome article, Chris.
Angel, I have nothing left to give you see. I stopped breeding and took care of them which only two went blind. The gene markers came to late and they all were to old to breed. My angels and bloodlines are all gone to be my real angels. I have nothing to offer but my collie art collection. I still have my beautiful memories of my singing not barking collie and his seeing eyes. Because you see, “Amazing Grace” was his first sing along to bagpipe music. Kathy
Yes Angel for everyone to see the truth of the money exchangers taking us with eyes to see, ears to hear, and a compassionate heart, but there is no room in the inn because they are creating burn out for the inn keepers. Warmest Regards
I believe this could be corrected with a Health registry included in the price not another institution that is charging for the right to participate. Everyone knows there are cost involved but marker test are nexpensive then another charge on top of that cost? So you have a blind catahoula in your program? Blind or Deaf or both? I think we now know why phenotypically the double merle and single dose does not typically express now in this breed. Again this is called “Somatic Mutation Cell” reversal of pigmentation I believe from my personal studies of experts in the field.
I have had the honor of meeting Jackson. Jackson was surrendered by his “breeder” to Collie Rescue of the Carolinas. (www.collierescue.net) He is a sweet, loving collie, and has a great temperament for therapy work.
Of course he is Anita, a handicapped collie is the most compassionate creature on earth.
Well yes Anita but please note the owner’s problem she most sincerely offers she faces within her family of dogs. Jackson does not do well with other dogs in her household. He is agressive? or is it just that he is so dependant on his seeing human? In my opinion, and from my experience this is not a breeding of compassion, understanding or love of the breed. Every collie, and human species should be able to enjoy free of pain or disabilities that gives them Life, Liberty and the pursuit of being happy within whatever life promises for them. However, those rights end at the tip of my nose.
The GSD, Captain Crunch, won the group title, but I felt so sorry for him wobbling along on his hind hocks with that extremely sloped back. Maybe if the Collie people started showing their blind and deaf dogs, instead of just breeding from them, they would beat out the lame German Shepherd Dogs?
Mary thanks for the irony laugh.
The blind white collie you refer to in the Purina Ad is Jackson, and he is our dog. Regarding irresponsible breeding, we are inclined to agree with much of what you have said. And yet, to take pity on Jackson is as least as absurd as taking pity on Stevie Wonder!
Jackson has become a local celebrity as a therapy dog. In his environment you would never believe that he is entirely blind and his sense of self says, ‘Elvis is back in the hotel’.
Our only problem with integrating Jackson into our pack of three other dogs was, due to his enormous self-confidence, his short fuse and his tendency to start fights.
Mostly, Jackson is a lover and seems to have an inspirational effect upon everyone he meets. Like Mabel, the lady with Jackson in the Purina Ad, he brings joy to all he touches, and we are certain his blindness plays no small role in this.
If Jackson can help draw attention to bad breeders, we will be glad. And yet, be certain that Jackson is just fine.
P.S. Go to Youtube/Blind Therapy Dog to find out more about Jackson!
Thank you for be such a great home for Jackson.
He is special I can see that without having ever meet him, congrats on having a wonderful soul mate & thank you for sharing him with others.
White Blind Collies: I believe the message here with Purina just might have us all confused why AKC Westminister dropped Pedigree as sponser. Difficult to understand if one is not conscious of changes in dog food issues as well. Pedigree has taken up to helping Rescue programs with free food so to speak> Now let us she the money changers working to get a bigger piece of the Dog money out there.
So for non bias …no propaganda lets not be multipulated again as Dog Lovers.
Let us do some very good journalism here and ask ourselves. Why did the Westminister AKC change sponsership from Pedigree to Purina. Was it not the UK who lost Pedigree’s sponsership three years ago from Pedigree for the big Crufts?
The question I have is:
Shouldn’t the congenital deformities of the double merle sire have caused the AKC to refuse to register him?
Or is it true that the only thing you need is two registered parents to create a “registered purebred” even if that animal is a mess of obvious genetic flaws?
I’m beginning to think that the ONLY good thing about registries is that they provide data for genetic studies, especially since animals with genetic flaws aren’t automatically kicked out of the registry. (ofc this would be devastating to some some breeds. Dalamatians in particular.)
I agree with you about the data for genetic studies. But, I also think registries should register ALL dogs and compile their health records as a database and make them available to anyone who asks.
There should be criteria for soundness that go across all breeds with special breed ratings for traits that are not sound, like the flat face, or other genetic anomalies.
Continuing to exclude dogs from registration does not help gather information we need to collect. But a general health rating could be recorded for each registered dog, with detailed info available.
Developing an all breed soundness standard, based on wolflike dogs could also clarify the various unsound conditions that are bred for. This would not be hard to quantify, if anyone was interested.
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I agree Kate a cost affective breeder available system is certainly in order it has been needed for a very long time. There is one now available, however again another tacked on expense.
The registry of the AKC went modern when they dropped the printing of stud books. Now you can go on site and get a print out for studies for $12.00 a piece. Of course, this is a seperate fee if one wants an AKC certified pedigree. Getting a pedigree with color of registered dogs …again
Basically, yes if both parents are AKC registered one pays to register a litter. Kathy
I want an open register where ALL dogs pedigrees & health results can be kept, no matter whether they are pure, pedigree, working or cross breed or part of a new breed programe.
Then we will really gets some conculsive data.
I agree Kate a cost affective breeder available system is certainly in order it has been needed for a very long time. There is one now available, however again another tacked on expense.
Example myself and one other collie breeder now share the offical documents with copy between ourselves of DNA testing FACTS.
These cost run into quite a sum of money.
Since neither of us currently offer anything for public stud or sell stock to the public for breeding it has not been necessary to post as good business practices.
http://www.rainshadecollies.com/DogStories/charlotte.html
Are you even capable of having a discussion like a human being, instead of just spamming the links to one breeder’s dogs’ profiles over and over like a spam robot?
I think by posting a link to one double merle who is not severely handicapped she is trying to say she thinks it is fine to breed litters where an average of 25% of puppies could potentially be deaf, partially sighted, blind, or eyeless.
Well Pai and Kate seems she does not have the typing skills or key word skills
to put in search engines Somatic Mutation Cells as a speculative reasoning for this phenotype, and to recognize its inheritance factors.
This type if deductive reasoning skills are taught in higher grade school levels these days,
Do you actually belief it’s Ok to breed a litter with a 1 in 4 chance of having it’s sight affected??? Or do you think we are misquoting the odds?
So what the link is 1 of the 3 out of 4 that may be Ok. Do we just pretend the 4th dose not exist?. They do, just they are not advetised often. Many are knocked on the head at birth which I would be quite suss of if a breeder told me they had never breed 1 after doing several merle to merle matings!
Sam your passion is refreshing to the health and welfare of our Collie. I would put the links of research but would that help since all she can reply with are photos.
This reminds me of my high school days getting my citizenship credits by volunteering to read material to the blind materials not trabsferred to Braille.
You see Sam there at this special school they also taught the deaf to speak with photos and visuals.
I actually have been attempting since my first replies to her postings to guess what she is trying to say. I feel like we are ib kindergarden on a rainy day playing mother may I or Simon Sez for physical and mental stimulation?
yep she is talking in riddles & links because she knows she has no real information to add. If she had proof or any one did we would be flooded with data & links to scientific study resuts. The links ect say a lot in some ways as dose the silence of many Collie breeders.
Hi,
I live in Sweden, here it is forbidden to mate merle/merle, is it legal in the US? I have informed Purina here in Sweden of the video showing the blind collie, I don´t think they should be connectet with such horrors…I find this depressing beyond words! Best wishes Ewa
No I’m afraid it is not a forbidden breeding in the USA, but we all think it should be.
I would be happy if the offspring of a merle to merle mating were not eligible for full AKC registration. Again, it would take the dollar signs out of the picture. :/