A little about us

We live in the village of Blantyre which lies on the banks of the River Clyde some 10 miles south of Glasgow.  Until 1995 we knew very little about dogs in general and Border Collies in particular. We had always been dog lovers but work commitments had prevented us from pursuing this interest as we would have liked. However, we were both given the opportunity of early retirement from our respective employments and grasped this with both hands.

Since we knew at least a year in advance of our impending retirement, we were able to make plans concerning how we wanted to spend the rest of our lives. We decided to involve ourselves in some sort of activity with dogs. Eventually we chose Border Collies and in 1993, John having retired first for health reasons, bought our first puppy, Jenna, purely as a pet.  We enjoyed working with her and learning about basic dog obedience at our local training clubs, but we really hankered after a dog we could show. So by late 1995 we had acquired a bitch puppy, Ceri, who, after much work and lots of perseverance, went on to become a show champion. By then the die was cast and we had succumbed to the dreaded "showing bug". We have had other dogs since then, some of whom we bred ourselves.

If you would like to know more about them, check out the pages which follow.

Our lives are now full. We love working with our dogs, training them, exercising them, grooming them for shows and doing all the other chores that surround them. Never once have we regretted our decision to share our lives with the wonderful breed that is the Border Collie.

Here are our three older collies, Travis, Gael and Ceri

A little history lesson:-

The village of Blantyre has two claims to fame. One brought faith, hope and medicine to many people, but the other brought heartache and poverty.

The missionary, Dr. David Livingstone was born in Blantyre in 1813, he was the son of a shopkeeper. David Livingstone started work at the age of 10, but nevertheless managed to educate himself and to study medicine and theology at Glasgow University to become a missionary doctor. He died in 1873 having refused to return to Britain.  However, his embalmed body was brought back and was buried in Westminster Abbey.

One of the worst mining disasters in Scottish history also occurred in Blantyre in 1877, when 207 miners where killed in an underground explosion.