Border Collie Bits!

In 116AD, a Roman named Marcus Terentius Varro was credited with having written many works on pastoral matters, including one on the care and training of the shepherd's dog. The word collie has several possible origins. The Gaelic term for anything useful is "collie." That would certainly have been an appropriate word to refer to this dog, which is useful at whatever it puts its mind to. The word for anything black is "coly."

Border Collie popularity exploded in the 1990s when the movie Babe (1995) was released. At the same time, the Border Collie acquired the distinction of being the "most trainable," only adding to its desirability. Unfortunately, many people didn't realize that with that trainability came loads of intelligence and energy, and many Border Collies ended up in shelters or with breed rescue groups, a problem that still exits today.