Reality Canine Center

On 4/7/2002, my husband and I purchased a female Border Collie puppy from Reality Canine Center for $500. Not long afterwards, the puppy began to have epileptic seizures which I had never experienced before. We immediately took her to the vet and he put her on phenobarbs. We gave her the medication faithfully but as time went on, the seizures grew increasingly more frequent and profoundly worse. At the age of 9 months, we had no choice but to put the dog down.

I contacted the breeder (Bridget) to inform her our $500 dog had to be destroyed and as luck would have it, she and her husband Sug were going to Wales to a sheep dog trial. For an additional $250, they could bring us back a new puppy. My husband was ecstatic so I begrudgingly agreed to it..We still own the Wales Border Collie to this day.

Bridget in the interim assured me that she was revamping her breeding program and had spayed and neutered the breeding dogs she thought were the epileptic carrierss and found them homes.

In Dec of 2005, we purchased a male Border Collie puppy for $600 from Reality Canine Center thinking the bloodlines were all new and finally free of epilepsy. Shortly after getting our new puppy home, he had what I believed to be a seizure. I was in total disbelief but went ahead and emailed Bridget to tell her since she still had a few of the litter left. She appeared to me to get angry and stated emphatically (and this is a quote) "We must never speak of this." I told her I was not trying to make her mad but only trying to warn her because of the other puppies. We never communicated again after that until April of this year when the dog was deteriorating to the point I knew we'd have to destroy him. I emailed her VERY upset and fairly disgusted about yet another very expensive dog that was yet another severe epileptic. She stated she was sorry but had quit breeding Border Collies so no further "heartache" would be coming from her end. Never mind the dogs she's sold throughtout the years that no doubt has it or is a carrier who will pass it on for generations to come, I looked (and copied) on her website to see that she had just bred and sold a litter in Nov of 2011 so she "quit" breeding about 4 months prior to her email. More than anything it concerns me that she did NOT want us talking about it or spreading it around that her dogs are epileptic, thus the demand that "we must never speak of this. Rather than be concerned, she acted like it was a personal attack on her and never mind the excessive amout of money we'd spent on a "quality" dog that was now having seizures. She never said one word about a refund or offered to take the dog back and exchange it for one that wasn't an epileptic. We were just on our own..

The $600 male Border Collie was put down yesterday on 8/9/2012 due to severe epilepsy at the age of 6 years and not quite 10 months old. When he left our farm, he was unable to walk or stand and did not know us anymore. I feel now it's time to "speak" about it. Nobody at Reality Canine Center is going to tell you the truth and after your hundreds of dollars are already in their pocket and you find yourself the owner of a dog that is NOT suited for anything due to their disease, you're pretty devastated. I very much want to spare others the heartbreak and financial ruin if I can at all,