Rooten Brook Sheepdogs

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	Left: Clougha Pike with Rooten Brook Farm in the foreground
The famous Longton sheepdog trialling family has farmed at Rooten Brook Farm for over 50 years, taking in four generations. It is situated on the western side of the Pennines with land from the valley bottom in Quernmore rising up to 1350 feet on top of Clougha pike, with outstanding views of the Morecambe Bay, southern tip of the Lake District and all over the Fylde coast. The farm is 800 acres, 350 acres of which is rough fell ground, which all the dogs are used to gather.

	The first of the Longtons to farm here was Tim Longton senior. He first came here in the late 1940’s when he took over the tenancy. An accomplished trialler who started trialling at the age of twelve, he won the English National at Morecambe with Dot (4844) in 1949, and was runner up at the Supreme in 1954, again with Dot.
	Left: Tim longton Snr with his National Champion Dot (4844).

Tim Longton was the next to farm here, settling here after working as a county patrol shepherd in Cumbria based at Tebay, then managing a 3000 acre hill sheep farm for the water board at Dunsop Bridge. He didn’t start trialling until 1947, when he was 29 years old, after serving in the Border Regiment, seeing action at Arnhem, as well as North Africa. He won the English National for the first time in 1965 going on to win it 5 times in all and the Supreme once in 1966 with Ken. He represented his country over 40 times at the International. When the BBC started with the idea of trialling on TV he was the obvious choice (due to his book A Sheepdog, Its Work and Training) to educate the producers and presenter Phil Drabble, and the first programme was filmed at Rooten Brook to show not only the trialling but also the training and working aspects of the sheepdogs.

Above: Tim Longton Jnr with his Supreme Champion Ken (17166)

	The farm is currently run by father and son Timothy and Michael Longton who spend their time tending to the flock of 550 Swaledale sheep and 80 suckler cattle, finding enough time to train sheepdogs.
	Left:Timothy sat in the grandstand at the International contemplating another run! Right:Timothy & Linda's son Michael
Timothy’s wife, Linda, also helps with the early training of the dogs taking them out to get socialised. Linda is also the current secretary of the Fylde Sheepdog Society, so she is also firmly into the dog scene.

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