Customer Reviews

Collie (Comprehensive Owner's Guide)

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I purchased this book because I own a Collie. I am dismayed at the amount of misinformation and disinformation contained within this book. The book is poorly written in parts, which creates contradictions from chapter to chapter. A novice would not be able to purchase and care for a Collie based on the information as it is presented.

I am convinced that the author never owned a Collie, nor even spent much time with one. The author states that the Collie requires more exercise than most breeds; this simply is not so. The Border Collie does, but not the Scotch Collie. It requires exercise, to be sure, and it is a large breed dog, but it is less active than a Parson Russell Terrier half its size.

The author is most egregious in the health chapters. The author is pushing a personal agenda that is not only dangerous for the dog, but could result in a dog being impounded by municipal animal control. In one sidebar, the author recommends against monthly treatment with a heartworm preventive, yet almost every municipality (or breeder contract, or adoption/rescue contract) requires the treatment with vermifuge. The author refers to the medicine as "poison" (does she even know that Ivermectin is used in people?) and recommends using the vermifuge every other month or every three months. A dog in poor health due to heartworms may be removed from its owner by local human authorities, and unfortunately, at this stage the treatment may very well kill the dog (the dying worms put the dog into shock). The author also recommends that in place of conventional veterinary medicine (again, see stipulations regarding dog health that originate from municipalities and contracts) owners should use homeopathic nostrums, which are nothing but water (something diluted millions or billions of times in water is water; someone who had only high school chemistry can tell you that). She also recommends against the use of prescribed flea and tick preventives, yet never mentions Lyme disease by name (although she identifies the bacterium that causes it). Lyme disease is a menace to people as well as to dogs, and the use of Frontline Plus or something similar on the dog is essential throughout the US.
Yet, she does not mention that the Collie breed is sensitive to certain medicines. Collies are prescribed a non-Ivermectin vermifuge (mine gets Interceptor), Colies should not be given Pepto-Bismol or other bismuth-based anti-diarrheal medicines, and so forth (great information is available on the Collie Health Foundation website, which is not mentioned).

Buy the Collie Concept by Bobbee Roos, it remains the standard book on the Collie breed.

I own two rough collies, a tri-colored and a blue merle. This book had great photographs and information regarding the collie. It has great information on plants that collies should stay away from such as the common daisy. Also, it praises the crate method, something I was against until I tried it with the collies and determined they love having their own space.

This book is full of good information about every aspect of owning a collie.

The book has great photographs very informative, it has lot of important information well organizet easy to read and understand. I found the information I needed for the problems that can be prevented from puppyhood through senior years. Is very practical informative and still fun to read.