There are still 3 Border Collie registries in the USA: the North American
Sheep Dog Society (NASDS), the American International Border Collie assoc.
(AIBC) and the American Border Collie assoc. (ABC or ABCA).  The latter is
the only really active one today. Parents must be registered in order to
register the offspring, and there is no differentiation on color or any
other aspect of looks. They each accept the others registration papers,
however, they are basically closed registries. Other registries register
the Border Collie, most notibly, the American Stock Dog registry, the UKC
and the AKC--I don't know what any of their policies are regarding
registration. And, as mentioned, the three all-BC organizations (NASDS,
AIBC, and ABC) may still do register on merit to some extent today, but any
black & white dog that had no herding ability and no pedigree could not be
simply registered just because it was black & white (or looked like a
Border Collie). Since at this point OTFS is just a concept and not a breed,
I really don't understand how anyone can talk about "half OTFS". Also,
since much of the Border Collie gene pool, even in this country, comes
directly from Britain, where there aren't a lot of ACDs (if any), it isn't
likely that there are a lot of ACD mixes in the BC genepool. Again,
evidence of this is not to be found in looks, but in temperament and
working style. The Border Collie has a reputation for having grown "soft"
over the years, not "hard". I would imagine if there was ACD blood in the
genepool, the opposite would be true. Why else would a Border Collie
breeder add ACD blood if not to toughen up his dogs? To use the appearance
of particular color patterns to substantiate the existance of genes from
other breeds is bogus, since it's possible for the BC to come in just about
any color, including red merle and brindle.

Carole Presberg