Rippletrix
Border Collies
Kate Clapperton has bred Border Collies for nearly forty years. She has built Rippletrix on three foundation lines she spent years combining — chosen, in her own words, for health and temperament first.
Sheffield · Kennel Club Assured Breeder · Veterinary Physiotherapist
Forty years, three foundation lines, one aim — the best possible life for every dog she produces.
Kate's first Border Collie — Dylan — came from an advert on the noticeboard at her agricultural college in Usk, Gwent. He wasn't pedigree. He taught her more about the breed than any textbook. Nearly forty years later, she has owned, worked, competed and lived with Border Collies through every colour, every line, every heartbreak and every triumph.
What became Rippletrix started with one dog she couldn't save — and one dog whose cruciate injury a vet missed. The first turned her toward health and welfare. The second turned her out of farming and into a veterinary physiotherapy career. Both are stitched into how she now breeds.
“My only aim is to give the ones I own the best possible life — full of adventure, wonder, experiences, learning and a whole lot of love. I can only hope the puppies I produce can have the best possible lives too.”
Psyfer.
Kinetic Sunset
Kate's once-in-a-lifetime dog. Red-and-white, working line, from a small kennel in North Yorkshire she found after years of looking. Driven. Focused. Her best friend. “I knew then,” she says, “that if I ever bred, he would be my king pin.”
Every stud dog listed at Rippletrix today carries his line. Switch, Bane and Trinity are his nephews. Toxic is his granddaughter. Rippletrix Hell Raiser, the coming stud, holds his blood on the sire's side. The kennel is built on Psyfer.
Kate lost him at fifteen. The last photograph in this section shows him one afternoon at the yard, elderly and settled, sitting alongside a young Toxic in front of an agility tunnel. The founder dog beside the granddaughter who would inherit the working torch.
The three foundation lines.
“Took me years to decide which lines to use to create mine,” Kate wrote to us in July 2026. What she chose, and why she chose it, is the entire pedigree behind every Rippletrix puppy. She made every decision on health and temperament first.
The North Yorks red-and-tri working line
Now carried by Switch, Bane and Trinity — all Psyfer's nephews.
Kate chose Christine's line because the dogs were well-loved, healthy, health-tested, well-exercised, with fantastic conformation. Psyfer came from her. So did every generation that followed.
The Fellspirit KC show line
Carried today by Rewind and his daughter Zombie.
Rewind — Fellspirit Free the Dream — brought a densely-championed show pedigree into the kennel. Kate later mated Psyfer with Rewind's dam Chi. The pups were well sought-after. She insisted on keeping two.
The Welsh working line
Brought in via Fusion — Coalfield Fusion of the Real.
Kate begged for Fusion. She wanted the amazing working champions on her side and the sires that feature in the pedigrees of top-class working and agility dogs. Fusion, mated to Switch, gave Kate her red girl Vampire.
Dallas, Vic, Roy — and Zak.
Kate came across Dallas as a stud pup some farming friends didn't want. When she saw his lines she couldn't say no. Dallas gave her links to International Supreme Champion Roy, and to Vic — his sire — who was a fantastic and well-sought-after stud dog.
When Kate needed a mate for her bitch Freak, she chose Hilltop Zak — because Zak shares a common ancestor, Tim, with Freak's own line. Kate connected the branches deliberately.
Four proven studs.
Each of the four Rippletrix stud dogs carries at least one of the foundation lines forward. Each is fully health tested to the recognised working-Border-Collie panel. Each is available at stud through the GenoVaq marketplace at £1,200 — or the equivalent of a bitch puppy from the resulting litter, by agreement.
The dams.
Kate spays each bitch after a single litter, as breeder policy. Every one of them has left something in the kennel — a daughter kept, a son given stud rights, a granddaughter waiting to be bred. The portraits below were shot on the physio conditioning platform at Kate's Sheffield yard.
Fusion
Coalfield Fusion of the Real · ISDS 00/362292
Kate's Welsh working red-and-white girl. Amazing working champions on her side. Dam of Vampire, by Switch.
Vampire
Rippletrix Fire Starter · Red & White · Born August 2023
Switch × Fusion. The full expression of Rippletrix's Welsh-working and North-Yorks lines combined. Competing at agility across the UK.
Niobe
Fellspirit Nio Be Speedy
Psyfer × Chi. Rewind's half-sister on the dam side. Mated to Dallas she gave Kate the girl Toxic.
Toxic
Dallas × Niobe · Competing at agility
Toxic carries three foundation lines in one pedigree: Dallas (Vic/Belle), Psyfer (North Yorks) and Fellspirit (via Niobe). Her next litter is planned by Rippletrix Hell Raiser.
Freak
Freak Out at My Love Bunny · ISDS 00/380009
Vic × Mari. Half-sister to Dallas on the sire side and to Ghost through the Mari dam-line. Now spayed after a successful March 2026 litter by Hilltop Zak — three pups to agility homes, three to working homes.
Zombie
Rewinds Little Fright · Rewind's daughter
Kate has since mated Zombie back to Switch. Their February 2026 litter included Rippletrix Hell Raiser. The next Zombie litter is planned for 2028; waiting list open.
Three matings, three generations.
Every pup produced from Rippletrix is fully health tested to the recognised breed panel, BVA eye tested and BAER tested before leaving the yard. Every pup Kate has ever bred stays on her record. She only lets them go to exceptional homes.
Where Toxic came from
A litter of eight — four black-and-white base coats, four blue merles from Niobe's side. Kate kept Toxic. The rest went to competitive homes across the UK.
Three to agility, three to working
Kate placed three pups to agility homes and three to working homes. Every one already competing or trialling. She kept the girl — Rippletrix Dee Seized Demon — as the next generation of the Zak connection.
Where Hell Raiser came from
Switch's working line back into the Fellspirit line via Rewind's daughter. Most of the litter went to agility homes. Kate placed one — Rippletrix Hell Raiser — locally, with stud rights retained.
Coming through.
Two Rippletrix pups Kate has kept back for the next chapter. Both represent the deliberate line-crossing she has spent thirty years perfecting. Both will join the marketplace roster when they are mature and fully health tested.
Rippletrix Hell Raiser
Switch × Zombie · Born 18 February 2026
“Creep” to Kate. The line-crossing Kate has been working towards — Switch's working sheepdog blood through Rewind's Fellspirit line. Placed locally with a friend. Stud rights retained.
Rippletrix Dee Seized Demon
Freak × Hilltop Zak · Born 07 March 2026
The girl Kate kept from Freak's March litter. Carries Freak's Vic-line blood and Zak's Tim connection — Kate's deliberate re-joining of two branches through a shared ancestor.
How Kate raises a Rippletrix puppy.
Just Kate and her dogs. No staff. She sleeps beside the whelping pen. She does gentle in-utero exercise with the dam through the pregnancy — a habit that came out of her veterinary physiotherapy work, and one almost no breeder does.
A whelping pen goes in Kate's van and at her Sheffield work yard. The pups travel with her. They sleep next to her. Her work yard is in the centre of Sheffield on a busy junction — the pups hear traffic from day one. They meet the washing machine, the treadmill, the physio clients' dogs, the people coming and going. They go out on the training field five or six times a day from four weeks old.
Every pup leaves fully health tested to the recognised working- Border-Collie panel — hips, elbows, eyes, CEA, TNS, CL, MDR1, IGS. Every pup is BVA eye tested and BAER tested. Every pup leaves with ten kilograms of food that will last until they change to adult food at five months, and with all the help and advice they could want, for life.
“I don't take puppies back once they have left me. I only let them go to exceptional homes.”
— Kate Clapperton, from “Top Tips for a Perfect Border Collie”, the induction pack Kate sends home with every Rippletrix pup. Read it in full on the GenoVaq Welfare Hub.
One yard in Sheffield.
“They are, in my opinion, the most amazing, intelligent and incredible dogs in the world,” Kate says. Here's the pack she has bred, competes with, and sleeps next to.
On film, too.
Kate has filmed her puppy foundation drills and a short-clip physio-education series alongside her long-form CPD. All free. All under her byline. Two rooms of content — one for owners, one for breeders and other professionals.
Puppy Foundation Exercises
The drills Kate takes every Rippletrix pup through from four weeks old — balance work, box hops, dog-walk entries, A-frame contacts, tyre approach, slope conditioning. Under a minute or two each. Under her byline.
Watch the series →Kate's CPD library
Kate's CPD workshop on canine fertility (long-form), plus a short-clip series on how to read pain and gait in a working dog — vocalisation, short striding, hip stiffness, trot vs walk. Reference material every breeder should have.
See the CPD →Talk to Kate directly.
Every Rippletrix stud service is arranged directly through Kate. Waiting lists are managed by her. Every pup Kate produces goes only to a home she has approved personally.
Rippletrix Border Collies · Sheffield, South Yorkshire · KC Assured Breeder · Veterinary Physiotherapist