Marjalu Rough Collies

My name is Tracy Oliver, and this is my story. As far back as I can remember, I have always loved dogs, but I must have been about eleven, before my parents would allow me to have one. My first dog was a Collie cross, but unfortunately, for me the puppy, had something seriously wrong with her, and died shortly afterwards. I was inconsolable, and I could not talk about her, without floods of tears.

At about thirteen, my parents decided to let me have another dog. This time it was a pedigree Irish Setter, I called him Red. I was walking him one day, when I met, a lady called Gloria French, she had about ten English Setters. To cut a long story short, I built up a good friendship with Gloria and her husband Frank. They treated me like another daughter, I used to walk their dogs for them, and help look after their puppies. They used to show their dogs, and this was my introduction to dog shows. The next dog I had was an English setter, which I showed lightly, but I did manage to qualify for Crufts with him.

I married at twenty one, my husband loved the dogs, and he caught the showing bug. We acquired quite a few more dogs all setters, and showed them, but most of the winning was done at open shows. When the marriage ended, I had to rehome a lot of the dogs due to having three young children. The years went, the kids got older, and I missed having a dog, so I went and bought a German Shepherd bitch. She seemed a bit lonely, so I went and got another one to keep her company. But the desire to show again, didn’t go away, but I didn’t want to show setters as my ex husband still showed them. You had to be fit to show shepherds, so I looked for another breed that appealed to me, which was the Rough Collie.

My affix MARJALU is a mixture of my children’s names. M is for Mark, AR is for Aran, JA is for Jake, LU is for Lucy, Luke and Lauren.
The highlights of my show career thus far are, 2 first places at Crufts, with two different dogs, under two different judges, at the same Crufts, and 2 Res. CC.s

We have had a good start to 2012 with our lovely Missy (Marjalu Talk Talk).

Midland Collie 1st Yearling Bitch/RBCC Judge Janet James.
Crufts 1st Yearling Bitch (the biggest class of the day) Judge Pauline Skyrme.
Northumberland and Durham Championship Show, 1st Yearling Bitch. BCC, BOB and BIS a day we will always remember and treasure - Judges Anne Hassock and Mr A Mather, we wish to express many thanks to the above judges.