What she said.

Yeah, I take your point.

Doesn't really help the argument about inclusion of mismarked pedigrees though. A mismarked Bernese has the same core ancestry as a perfectly marked one, so including them in the breeding programme actually isn't going to make a blind bit of difference in widening that bottleneck you mentioned. In these circumstances, the only way to widen that basal gene pool would be to open the books to dogs of other breeds, which goes back to the problem of altering the breed.

ps. What happened to the Bernese? Just changes in popularity, or something more dramatic?

It does though increase the selection base on other criteria such as health, which in the Bernese is critical.

As with many breeds, it was at the time of WW11 when very few were bred. A Newfoundland cross, which may or may not have been accidental, was used and may have helped in some ways but probably not the best choice as far as health is concerned.

"Doesn't really help the argument about inclusion of mismarked pedigrees though. A mismarked Bernese has the same core ancestry as a perfectly marked one, so including them in the breeding programme actually isn't going to make a blind bit of difference in widening that bottleneck you mentioned. In these circumstances, the only way to widen that basal gene pool would be to open the books to dogs of other breeds, which goes back to the problem of altering the breed."

It doesn't widen the pool, but it does make it smaller. Taking out the colour (mismark) means that your potentially missing out on a healthy dog, meaning your leaving behind unhealthy ones. What SHOULD be happening (and isn't for all breeds) is that colour should be the last thing on anyones mind, and they should disregard the unhealthy ones, and only breed from healthy (good tempered) individuals. Of course the champs winning the shows are all young, and bred from several times passing on their genes down the line, before health issues are even raised. In an ideal world only 6 year olds would be bred from (giving time for health problems to appear)

Not entirely true, BC's were originally bred for working ability and still are. They were registered by the ISDS long before the KC and still are, showing has nothing to do with it. Show bred BC's all seem to have lots of coat and short legs, yes I can see how that helps them to work sheep.........

That is not actually true, shepherds believe that white border collies don't have the respect of the sheep as they are the same colour. Deef's mother was white and she managed to work sheep VERY well. It is an old wives tale along with the one about dogs with pink and black spotted mouths are no good and merles won't work

Like people have said breed standards are there for a reason - to keep breeds seperate. Not all show dogs are unhealthy or perfectly marked - Isla's Dad had a mismarked face (plus his JW and 2 RCCS, 3:3 hips, MRD clear, fuco clear and GPRA/PRA clear) and her Mam was undersized for her breed (MRD clear, fuco clear, GPRA/PRA clear) due to being from a litter of 11.

But thankfully Isla's breeders are sensible enough to use them for breeding, not all show breeders breeds purely for aesthetics.