Black / brown Colouring in litters

[Pip895]

It is fascinating - Saffis mum was liver and her dad lemon & white with a pink nose.  There were two black two brown and five lemon pups, two of the lemon pups had black noses three had pink.  All had relatively dark eye colours - mid to dark brown.

Cant quite work it out but would that mean that Saffis mum (Liver) would have to have had two liver genes one lemon and one black?  Her Dad being lemon and white with a pink nose presumably couldn't be carrying black at all?

[Jane S]

Cant quite work it out but would that mean that Saffis mum (Liver) would have to have had two liver genes one lemon and one black?  Her Dad being lemon and white with a pink nose presumably couldn't be carrying black at all?

Recessive colours like liver and lemon/orange can't carry black but they will produce black puppies if mated to a black as black is dominant over all other colours (other colours could also be produced if the black carries recessive genes for liver or lemon etc)

[Pip895]

That's what I thought - so ware did the black come from in a Liver/lemon & white mating? - I seem to remember one or perhaps both black pups had white bibs - is the "black & white" gene more recessive?  

I read somewhere that a lemon dog with a pink nose could not carry black in any form - so can a liver dog with brown nose carry black/black & white?

[Helen]

white bibs are common and not an 'and white' marking - they are classed as solids, and a high proportion of black and Liver dogs will have them.

[Jane S]

That's what I thought - so ware did the black come from in a Liver/lemon & white mating? - I seem to remember one or perhaps both black pups had white bibs - is the "black & white" gene more recessive?

I read somewhere that a lemon dog with a pink nose could not carry black in any form - so can a liver dog with brown nose carry black/black & white?

Liver to Lemon can and will produce black puppies eg if a lemon parent which doesn't carry liver is mated to a liver which doesn't carry lemon, pups will be black but that's not because they "carry" black as such - recessives cannot carry a dominant colour. Black is produced because their particular genetic combination makes it impossible for other colours to come through (ie it's kind of the default colour which is an over simplification but hopefully you get the gist)

Cocker colour inheritance is a very complicated subject with so many colour genes involved and is impossible to explain in depth in a short post on a forum -I had to buy a very in depth book on canine genetics to get to grips with it when I was first became interested many years ago (this book, Genetics of The Dog by Malcolm Willis, is now sadly out of print but is a fantastic resource) If you are interested in this subject, I'd really recommend doing further reading - there are quite a few useful sites on the net eg

http://www.ecsca.org/ecscoat.html

http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/genetics/colorgen.html

http://homepage.usask.ca/~schmutz/dogcolors.html

[Pip895]

Thanks Jane - really fascinating stuff - I sometimes wish I had studied Biology/Genetics more at university rather than going into Chemistry.  I shall enjoy perusing your links.