About DNA Testing

DNA screens our Border Collies for a number of known hereditary genetic diseases. Many of the Border Collie conditions we test for are recessive, which means a dog generally needs to inherit two copies of the disease-causing variant, one from each parent, to be affected. A dog with only one copy is considered a carrier. Carriers are healthy and do not develop the disease, but they can pass that variant to some of their puppies. This is why responsible pairing is so important. If one of our dogs carries a single copy of a recessive variant, we only breed that dog to a mate that has tested clear for that same condition. In that type of pairing, none of the puppies can inherit two copies, so they are not at risk of being affected by that disease. Some puppies may be carriers, but they will not be affected. Our goal has always been to carefully reduce hereditary disease within our Border Collie lines while also preserving the health, temperament, structure, working ability, and genetic diversity of the breed. We use DNA testing as a breeding tool rather than automatically removing every carrier from the gene pool, because eliminating otherwise excellent dogs solely because they carry one recessive variant can unnecessarily reduce genetic diversity. We review the genetic results of both parents before every breeding and make sure we never knowingly produce puppies at risk for the hereditary diseases we can test for.