H erding Dogs

looked upon its author as merely writing for notoriety andthe usual penny a line.

Collie Folio, February 1909, p. 69:

50 far so good, and for the achievement of these merciesthe entire fancy ought to be specially grateful ta Mr W.Stephens, the Collie enthusiast and member of theCommittee of the Kennel Club, Mr W. T. Herry, and MrJ. H. Jacques. We propose to purchase each a halo to beworn on state occasions.

The Kennel Club have further enacted that owners ofthese Toys who have erroneously registered them asCollies can re-register them under this new 'Any otherv~riety clas~' free of charge. Scribes who have taken theview opposrte ta our own may now prepare a suitablememorial service in commemoration of their dear littleidols, and no doubt we shall be treated to sorne eleverwriggling. For the present, therefore, we leave the subject,but can promise a return to it if at any future time effortsare made to resuscitate the agitation which had for itsobjective such unworthy ideals.

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15The Bearded Collie or Beard

Part of the early history of this useful type of herdsman's dogbefore it became a pedigree fixed breed, is also to be found inthe history of the drovers' and Smithfield dogs. Research intoits origins, however, has presented more difficult problems.The variety of titles given to this type of dog ranges fromScotch, Highland or mountain collie to hairy mou-ed or shep-herd's cur, depending upon the area in which one met him.Each title warranted separate research ta try to establish hisancestry, and it has been both a fascinating and a frustratingexercise. Fascinating because it led me ta discover so manyfacets of rurallife one does not normally encounter, and frus-trating because I could find no authenticated written referenceof its real origin, just a few far-fetched speculations.

The writings of my great-uncleJames Bourchier, who madean extensive study of European and North African herdingdogs, gave me one possible clue to their ancestry. He believedthat the shaggy types of the British Isles evolved from dogsbrought over from North Africa by the Romans, like theEgyptian sheepdog, sometimes called armant, which cornesfrom a district of that name in upper Egypt. When brought taEngland just after the First World War by the Egyptian Am-

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burn introduced me to a Northumberland farmer who wascompeting with his 'beard', as the locals called him; he gave mefood for thought about origins. He had asked to meet mebecause of our mutual interest in old shepherding books. Re-grettably, like so many with great stores of knowledge on thesematters, he has since passed on, and his sons have forsakenfarming. His family had bred and worked this variety on thelocal sheep runs together with a few terriers (for differentpurpose) for several generations.

During our conversation that bleak autumn afternoon heemphatically pointed out to me thar there was no intercoursebetween England and Scotland until 1603 when James VI ofScotland became James 1of England, and then it was not untilalmost a century later that trade in agriculture and livestockbegan to flourish between the two countries. Important his-toric events are never forgotten in the Border counties. Thisfarmer said they may have been an ancient pastoral breed, butnot of Scottish origin, for it was only since the early part of thenineteenth century that a pure strain of this type of herding dogbecame established over the Border, being descended from astrain of droving dog brought into Scotland from Wales andwest of the Pennines about a century earlier. 1later discoveredhe was referring to what were called the Galloway types.

It was obvious from our conversation that he had caréfullystudied his excellent collection of dog books, and also those onlocal farming history. He was most amusing - and often a littleuncomplimentary - about those who concerned themselveswith writing on pastoral dogs or other farming matters, and aswe looked through sorne of his books we discussed the value ofthe information given about this type of dog. ln particular, thereferences to Scotch or Highland collies in Edward Jesse's Anec-dotes of Dogs (1846), as the title implies, must be treated withsorne scepticism. Reading through its pages one is aware that itis intended as a witt y or fun book, written with tongue in

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bassador, one of these dogs created great interest, and accord-ing to an account in The Field those who saw him said he couldnot be distinguished from our own beardie types found nearthe English/Scottish border counties at thar time. '

It is interesting thar the armant and a Pyrenean breed, thelabrit, are very similar in appearance to our old beards, andboth are found working on opposite shores of the Mediterra-nean. Few people have the opportunity to see the smallerBasque or Pyrenean breeds at work, but they do appear in theFrench show rings, and when groomed and trimmed, they lookexactly like a sm aller version of a beardie.

The beardie is also iikened to the berger de Brie or briard,but in fact he is far more like the berger de Pyrénées, a realshepherd's working dog of which the labrit is one variety.These dogs must not be confused with the large white moun-tain dogs of the region, which were used only forguarding, notherding. There is also a Hungarian cattle dog called a pumi,very similar in appearance to a beardie, and he in turn must notbe confused either with the Hungarian puli, a dog of totally dif-~erent appearance. There are also shaggy types of herding dogsln Poland and other countries bordering the Baltic around theGulf of Riga.

Other historians believe that he is descended from a shaggytype of herding dog brought to Britain by the Anglo-Saxonfarming communities, and that possibly both the bobtail andthe beardie share this same ancestry. 1have mainly confined mystudy of his history and evolution to his role as drover's dog, inwhich capacity 1dispute theassumption that he is related to thebobtail, for reasons 1 have given in chapter 4. Unfortunately,when the bearded type was being transformed into a fixedrecognized breed, sorne bobtails were used. It is also claimedthat this variety of collie is 1f ancient Scottish origin, but 1donot accept this. 1

A few years ago the secretary of a sheepdog trial near Otter-

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cheek, and thar the information is at best misleading. ln theSportsman's Cabinet, vols. 1 and 2 (1803 and 1804), neither ofwhich he had read he told me, the chapters or brief references toScotch collies were written by sportsmen not involved in theshepherding scene and also make curious reading in places. Aswe have already seen, the Reinagle illustration often claimedfor this breed has been claimed for several other breeds as weIl.

James Dalgliesh in his chapter on collies in Leighton's TheNew Book of the Dog (1907) refers to Scottish or Highlandcollies, but gives no history of the breed. He states that Peeble-shire was the true home of the beardie and that he had judgedthem at several pastoral shows in the area, adding that SirWalter Thorburn, a patron of the breed, contributed prizesannually at three shows for the best bearded dogs owned by ashepherd. ln fairness to this gentleman it should be pointed outthat the editor Robert Leighton states in his Preface that he has'altered, excised or amplified sorne of the chapters to bringthem into literary harmony'; perhaps this was also the casehereas he includes rough and srnooth show collies under the sameheading.

The Bearded Collie, a Foyles' handbook published in 1971and written by the late Mrs Willison, was the first book aboutthe breed. ln ir she made no extravagant claims about its earlyhistory, simply repeated the opinions of others while giving anaccount of the part her own dogs played in the breed's revival.

Personally, 1have only come upon one or two beardie typesin Peebleshire, and it is curious that 1did not encounter any inthe Highland regions of the north, although that is not to saythere were none there. However, ir gives sorne hint thar theoriginal title 'Highland' may in fact have referred to the Gallo-way Highlands, as 1 found more evidence of the breed on thewest coast, and of course in the north-west of England, thanelsewhere.

When researching in the Border counties of England, 1 Ire- '

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The Bearded Collie or Beard

quently met shepherds working with a beardie type, sorne withstumpy- or bob-tails. They told me thar this was the old-typedrover's dog used for collecting livestock across the Border ineither direction. 1 was also informed that he was a useful,strong ma~ket or butcher's dog. Before rail transport, graziersfrom the north of England made frequent trips to the High-lands with flocks of young sheep as replacements or for cross-breeding, returning with cattle and ponies and accompanied by- possibly local - dogs. Cattle, hors es and ponies broughtdown by Yorkshire drovers are mentioned in many records,yet there is no description of the dogs, and without them, thejourney could not have been accomplished. It is quite conceiv-able that the dogs taken on the outward journey were their ownlocal dogs, familiar with the flocks, and local dogs familiar withthe ways of wild cattle and ponies may have been used on thereturn journey. ln the past dogs were bred and broken for thistype of work and owed no allegiance to their masters, their es-sential qualities being a strong constitution and the ability tosurvive.

The rearing of Galloway horses and cattle in that region ofScotland had always been a specialized business, and horsebreeding was an essential part of the economy of most farms.The ancestors of sorne lines of our Dale and Fell ponies can betraced back to the hardy ponies of Scotland, Galloway stallionsbeing especially useful for crossing with local mares. Gallowaycatrle were regularly sent down to the lush pastures of Norfolkand Suffolk to be fattened, before being sent on to Smithfieldmarket. It is known thar the dogs that accompanied thesedroves were aIl of the droving beardie type; strong, determineddogs which later became known as Smithfield collies, they werebigger and longer on the leg than the beardie we see today.

Information of this nature gives great credibility to thetheory thar there were two strains, the Border, and the High-land or Galloway. A farmer in the mountain regions around

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,~~:26 A group of beardie and border collies belonging to a

shepherd in Crammie, Glen Cora, Scotland

Craven, in the Eastern Dales of North Yorkshire, knownlocally as the Craven Highlands, told me thar the dogs used onthe local farms were described as 'Highlanders', and that thoseused as shepherds' dogs were somewhat smaller .than thedroving strains. The beardie and border types were frequentlycross-bred and the different working instincts of each typeseemed to complement each other in the offspring.

ln their delightful book, Life and Traditions in the YorkshireDa/es, Marie Hartley and Joan Ingilby give us this amusinglittle snippet.

A'Yorkshire grazier by the name of Birtwhistle, from 1795

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The Bearded Collie or Beard

onwards regularly brought cattle and ponies fromScotland, and at times as many as 20,000 head of Scotchcattle could be counted on his grazings near Malham inYorkshire. Wh en crossing the border into England, heemployed a piper who headed the entourage aIl the way onto their new grazing:

They also tell us that

The Pratts families in Upper Wensleydale regularly visitedOban, Lanark, Sterling and the Islands in the first half ofthe nineteenth century. A descendant, James Pratts (1852-1927) of Burtersett, stayed at the Caledonian Hotel,Lanark, for sixt Y consecutive years, visiting auction martsand farms to buy Scotch cattle, shorthorns and sheep.Until1965 Mr E. Pratts continued to bring down cattle bytrain from Scotland each spring and autumn.

We read elsewhere of lots of 40 to 100 cattle and any numberof up to 600 sheep being brought down together in' Septemberalong the old drove roads, walking 15 to 20 miles a day depend-ing on the weather. Local drovers brought them as far as theBorder, resting at night in inns, farm buildings or caves, wellwrapped up in their plaids, and then others took over. Forthose who hold strong beliefs that this is purely a Scottishbreed, th en there is no doubt that the deerhound figures in thefamily tree of the types found north of the Border. 1 feel the oldWelsh.grey figures in the.family tree of those from south of theBorder, but ir was the beardiejborder crossed types which werethe most useful, and they are still used on farms today.

ln The Deerhound George Cupples mentions in severa],places the usefulness of the deerhound/collie cross, but we areleft to guess which type of collie is meant. According to the hillshepherds 1 have spoken to, both in Wales and Scotland, theold-type beardie or shaggy dog was an excellent cattle dog, but

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when an all-purpose dog was required they were crossed withthe border collie types found in the Lowlands of Scotland andthe Border counties of England. The temperament and quali-ries produced by these crosses seemed to complement eachother so weIl that the resultant offspring were bred together fora further generation or two and then the process started againwith fresh blood.

The crosses mentioned above produced two types of strainsof beardie, one being black and white and referred to as theBorder strain and the other being fawn, grey or brindle andreferred to as the Highland strain. The former were verypopular at early sheepdog trials. The Highland strain may bedescended from the forest dogs or he may be the deerhound/collie cross or indeed come from the strain found in the Gallo-way Highlands which were regarded as excellent hill dogs,possibly from an infusion of blood of each type.

. Many early illustrations, entitled either the English bobtail,the Scotch bobtail or Scotch collie, aIl appeared very similar. Itwould be unlikely that an artist should see a working dog innatural full coat; when the sheep were clipped out or shorn,dipped or salved, so too were the sheepdogs, thus mu ch woulddepend on the stage to which the coat had grown when theartist saw the dog.

Before chemical washes and insecticides came on to themarket, sheep suffered one further indignity .at the hands ofman, that of being 'salved' in the early autumn. This involvedrubbing the sheep over with afoul-smelling mixture of oils, tarand fats. The treatment.acted as a pesticide and also as a valu-able protective coating in bad winters.or snowy conditions byholding the fleeces together, and the dogs also underwent thesame treatment.

Onsome farms this practice was carried out.until190S whenthe compulsory dipping order came intoforce. If a sheep has along and heavy coat it parts with the weight of the snow, allow-

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The Bearded Collie or Beard

ing the damp to penetrate into the underfur and often causingpneumonia. This can also happen to a heavy-coated dog, if notclipped or treated in sorne way. The dogs had a second appli-cation to the legs and belly at the onslaught of win ter to preventsnow balling, a very necessary precaution when dogs areworking in deep snowdrifts. A recipe given in one book for thismixture was one gallon of tar to 17lb of butter - it is no wonderthat farm dogs were not welcome in the house! The beardiesseen in the ring today, with carefully groomed, long, texturedcoats, often parting down the centre back, due to excessivelength, could never survive in the snows or heavy mists, butfortunately they no longer have 'to.

By the 1800s a definite fixed type had emerged in Scotlandwhich was similar in appearance to the Welsh types, but said tobe a selected strain from deerhound/collie crossing. This newScottish beardie was more of a sheepdog than drover's dog .Beardies are not silent workers, nor do they work in the samemanner as the border collie: they hunt and give tongue whenapproaching their quarry, which has the effect of causing sheepto herd together, and ewes and lambs to 'mother-up'. When theflock has gathered, then another dog, often a silent worker likethe border collie, is sent up to bring the flock down from thehills.

To locate stray sheep away up on crags or mountainsides isvery different from herding sheep on marsh or lowlandgrazing. Weather conditions in Scotland often make it imposs-ible for a shepherd to see his flocks, but a team like this cangather and drive by sound and scent in almost aIl weather con-ditions. It can be appreciated that as hill dogs beardies weremost useful, and as drovers' dog they were invaluable. Whenworking as a team with border collies they were capable ofgathering any livestock from remote are as and then holding theflocks or herds together day and night for the duration of thedrive.

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H erding Dogs

27 A Perthshire shepherd with two beardie/border crosses.Photo: Bertram Unne

At the turn of the century, with the exception of a few regis-tered with the International Sheepdog Society as workingsheepdogs, the beardie was threatened with extinction; its placewas being taken by the more fashionable border collie whichwas gaining popularity in the trial field: The farmers, particu-larly in Scotland, who bred and used the beardie type, did nottrouble about pedigrees or breed points until the formation ofthe International Sheepdog Society, and even then only a fewdogs were registered here as sheepdogs under rough, smoothor beard-coat types. Shepherding was more to the Iiking ofbeardie owners than cornpeting at trials, which was both cosdyand time-consuming.

Dr Russell Greig, a well-known Scottish veterinary

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The Bearded Collie or Beard

surgeon, had a great interest in Scottish working dogs. He feltthe breed should not face extinction, so he set about foundingthe first bearded collie club in 1912 in Edinburgh, and a briefbreed standard was drawn up. Unfortunately the club only sur-vived for a few years and folded up after the outbreak of theFirst World War. No further attempts were made until1930when that great doggie personality Jimmy Garrow, togetherwith Mrs Cameron Miller, tried once again to revive interest,but this project also faded out. It is not clear if the breed wasrecognized by the Kennel Club or indeed if application had beenmade at thar rime, but twenty-five years later the beard seemedto have slipped in quietly through the back door and became apedigree-fixed breed with full Kennel Club recognition and hasbecome very popular in the show and obedience ring. For thisaIl praise must go to the late-Mrs Willison who did so much inre-establishing the breed, partly through a chance meeting withMrs Cruft, the wife of the man who gave his name to the mostfamous dog show in the world. Mrs Willison's original beardiebitch was bred in Scotland by a Mr McKie of Killiecrankie,and Mrs Cruft helped to locate a mate for her in Devon,so north and south met up to produce a litter that was tostart the revival of this attractive herding dog, albeit in a newrole.

Mrs Willison told me thar in the early days of breedingbeardies it was quite usual to find one or more pups in a Iitterwhich resembled border collies, no doubt a throw-back to thecrosses 1 mentioned earlier. Since the beardie collie has becomean exhibition dog, a study of his physical points has claimed theattention of breeders above aIl else, and he has become what istermed the 'improved' type. Working tests have been drawn upfor owners who wish to participate, but these are more in theform of temperament and obedience tests and not a test of theirability to control any form of stock.

Here once again we have a case where, if a breed had not been

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H erding Dogs

28 Gillaber Glendronach, a bearded collie owned by MrsGill and Mrs Cook. Photo: Diane Pearce

taken up by the show fraternity, it could well have faded outIthas inevitably altered, but so long as these dogs continue to givepeople pleasure and companionship this is sufficient reward initself.

The Bearded Collie Club was founded by Mrs Willison in1955, yet the inadequate breed standard drawn up in 1912 bythe defunct club in Scotland appears to have been the one inforce when bearded collies were granted championship statusby the Kennel Club in 1959. A Kennel Club breed standard wasissued in 1964 and altered in 1978, but it was not until1972 thatthe breed club held its first championship.

When the breed was first recognized, only a few exhibitsappeared at championship or open shows, but separate classesfor beardies were scheduled at other collie shows. The first

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The Bearded Collie or Beard

champion of the breed was Ch. Beauty Queen of Bothkennar,suitably named, bred and owned by Mrs Willison.

1 remember judging the classes for the breed at a LondonCollie Club show in 1964. There were twelve entries in twoseparate classes, and all except one were sired by Bothkennardogs. The Best of Breed on that occasion went to Miss M. A.Taffe's Heathermead Magic Moments.

At present there are two breed clubs with branches in variousparts of the UK which give valuable information and help toowners, and there are also one or two good books catering forthe modern history of the breed, exhibiting and general care(see Bibliography).

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