Heh, Chloe's mix is actually a "breed"

[Ritz459]

Who knew? She is as much of a breed as a Lurcher or Alasken Husky is, but her "breed" does have a name. I was browsing dogbreedinfo and came across Scotch Collies (which are basically a working Collie - Scotch Collie Information and Pictures, Scotch Collies, Farm Collies, Old Farm Collies) . I thought, "Wow, those really look like Chloe!" So I did some more research.

I cannot explain everything I found out, as I still don't quite understand it, but here are two links that explains pretty much everything:
American Working Farmcollie Association including Working English Shepherds, Rough Collies, Working Farmcollies, Farmdogs, Aussies, Shelties, Farm dogs (If you click on the training sidebar on this site, they talk about an English Shepherd puppy that sounds so much like Chloe it is scary.)

What is a Farm Collie?

Chloe's sire and dam were used to help out around the farm (as guardians to horses and vermin catchers), so I suppose Chloe is a Farm Collie! Too bad she is scared of cows and barks at pigs. Not much herding drive in her, but then again, I never really worked with her on it. I'm sure if I had got her for a herding dog and socialized her extensively to stock she would have been wonderful. Her parents didn't herd though, so that may play a large part in it.

She does, however, love to hunt. But while she likes to hunt, she also knows which animals are "hers". She chases wild birds and rabbits (or tries to, anyway) with a passion, but she loves Joey and my ferrets. When I first introduced her to my ferts she kept looking at me like, "I'm supposed to be gentle with these, right?" and she is extreamly careful around them.

And she has a watchdog instinct as well. She knows who should be around and who shouldn't and she will tell me if something is wrong. The other day our hose was on and we didn't realize it. It was flooding our front flower bed. Chloe kept scratching at the front door and I figured she had to go out. I took her outside and she went right to the flowerbed and kept looking at the hose that was blasting water like, "Okay mom, are you going to turn it off yet?" My mom thanked her for that one.

It is sort of ironic though, because the reason we have her today is because my Grandpa had a Farm Collie when he was growing up and he said it was the best farm dog they had ever had. He said that Chloe was going to be a really good dog too and we just had to keep her.

Well, okay, she may not technically be a Farm Collie, but she's pretty darn close. I'll use these definitions of a Farm Collie to fit her:
"The term "farm collie" has been used simply as an indicator of place of residence: any dog of (primarily) collie descent that lives/lived on a farm. In contemporary usage this might include dogs of any modern collie breed or collie cross or mix. &
"Farm collie" has been used as an indicator of actual function: a dog of (primarily) collie descent that did or does work on a farm--with livestock or perhaps as a watch dog. In contemporary usage this might include dogs of any modern collie breed or collie cross or mix."

[Tortilla]

My Sally is a 'Scotch' Collie, too.