Rough Collie

The Rough Collie came from Scottish working sheepdogs, then took a different road: Queen Victoria's fondness for collies in the nineteenth century, and later the Lassie films, turned it into a show and family dog. Most are now bred for the ring and the home rather than for stock work. That history makes it the gentlest, most biddable collie here, though plenty still circle and bark at running children. Ask breeders about the MDR1 gene, which makes some dogs dangerously sensitive to common drugs, and about Collie eye anomaly; both are widespread in the breed.