breeding snafu? Help! - Page 5

I suppose like they said already - "could happen" but it would be a rarity and I'd love to see the sable dog PROVEN to be born to two non-sable parents.  If it did happen it would be one for the record-books.  My point is, it just doesn't happen, so unless you want to make things much  more complicated than need be - keep it simple as in my first post.

speaking of tortie or calico cats - there is an article just today on my internet homepage about a male torti cat - like one in a million they say. 

molly

Why argue what has been observed many times over in lab studies?  As well as also been proven by having been intentionally induced, as the above cited study (as well as others) have tested.  If dogs could propogate as swiftly as mice and be as reasonable to maintain for scientific research, or dog breeders shared the same interest and purpose of intent as scientists, the record would show.

Obviously, DNA testing hasn't been widely available over the last 100 years to prove much to your satisfaction.  You have to realize that the black & tan and the solid black versions of the agouti series are merely variants themselves of the original wild-type (sable).  Rather than solely from mutation, most likely, these variants are derived from the wild-type due to various regions of the allele operating with a loss of function, at least in instances where self-color (black) is appearant.

If you care to, contact Taunya Mravik about Dolf z Eurosportu, and ask if he was DNA tested.  He's a sable male that spawned from a black sire and very melanistic black&tan.

Evolution itself is "just a theory", and if you don't like complicated, so what?  It was yourself not so long ago, making similar observations of bicolors producing (more dominant) black&tans.  What a perfect model really; a reversion of loss of function in portions of the allele, rather than the "tagged gene" theory that you just made up.

Bicolor is a black and tan dog.  There are three colors - sable, black/tan, and black - with variations of each (yea, even black has "laquer or solid" black, and black with fading.  Black and tans - saddle-back, blanket-back, black/cream, black/tan, black/red, bicolor.  Sables - grey, dark, red, black sable.  But it all comes back to the basic three colors - sable, bl/tan, and black.  So it CAN be very simple.  Or very complicated if you choose to get into the "alleles" and blah blah blah <crapola>.  I obviously prefer the proven simple way to explain things, the rest gives me a headache, can't even read your posts for the most part Daryl - like reading an economics book in college - hated that class.

Yep, I would have to see the proof in DNA of Dolf before I'd believe his parentage was correct.  So, no sable dogs from two non-sable parents, that is proven other than the breeders word?  I thought not.

molly

But can you give at least one pedigree database example where bicolor X bicolor (or black) produces black & tan?  Don't need to see dna or anything, I've just never found an example, though you've said it happens.  But you've seem to come up with a well accepted definition of the bicolor phenotype, which makes good sense.  Either a modification from another locus or a subtle alteration of the black & tan allele, the hereditary rules of dominance seem to hold, B&T being dominant to Bi. 

Textbook science is going to be a bit more accurate than homemade cookie-cut genetics.  You don't just make up stuff and start preaching it as truth.  Do you take that approach in training?  Every dog the same, and avoid the finer details?  Breeding healthy hips or temperament characteristics is a trickier business than coat color, but not worth a headache I suppose.  There's always the "wing it" method, or breed to the popular dog of the day, with the most titles, highest scores or whatever.

For any two fields of practice to grow efficiently with a common goal, (i.e., dog breeding and science) there needs to be a common language developed, and a crosstrained uderstanding of what the other side does.  If your doctor is your dentist, you might not want to crawl out of the dark ages, but no need to admonish those who are interested, even if you're not.

I AM interested, if what is being "preached" is the truth and proven to be.  In ALL of the hundreds of thousands of GSDs out there over the years (and DNA has been around for many years) - where are the sables produced from two non-sable parents?  answer = there aren't any.  Except for the "oopses" whose breeders claim to be - still not proof - the one dog you gave example of supposedly came from a black/tan dam and a black sire - siblings were black and bl/tan - so my question would be which sable stud dog had access to the female during her heat cycle?  DNA would prove it, I'm certain. 

As for bicolor I am sure it does have separate genes of some sort "attached" to the black/tan color gene.  This is my simple way of explaining things - nothing "made up" to suit me - just what I have discovered over 12+ years of breeding GSDs.  I think bicolor is a black/tan dog with a modifyer gene "tag" (my own term for it to make things easy to understand).  In Germany there is no "bicolor" - they are considered bl/tan along with every other pattern of bl/tan.  But I do think it is "different" if not completely separate from bl/tan - and is recessive to the normal bl/tan saddle back and blanket back patterns.    Or maybe it is completely separate from bl/tan - if so why in the world wouldn't the SV recognize it as an individual color and pattern - surely the breeders over there would have noticed the difference by now, well before you and I did.

I have had several dark bl/tans that produce bicolor dogs, and several bl/tans that did not produce bicolors (though they are very close and many would call them bicolor).  I have a grey sable female who produces bicolor, ALL of her bl/tan puppies are bicolor, no bl/tan of any other color pattern.  I have a bicolor female who does not carry black recessive, who produces bicolor and sables with bicolor "recessive" (when bred to a sable dog).   She is interesting because when bred to a black dog, she produces varying levels of "darkness" in her bicolor offspring - some are more "muddied" than others ie some have bright and visible tan markings on face, legs and others have little to no markings on face and black covering legs and feet.   So her two color genes are bicolor dominant (she is a bicolor) and "bright" bicolor recessive?  Gets more complicated the more you think about it.

molly

Well, I'm just saying it's "proven" in mice, and very likely that it could be proven in dogs.  I'm sure the "oopses" probably outnumber those occasions thousands to one.

"the reversion of a to a^t and A^w occurs with a frequency of 4.7x 10^-6"

Maybe that's a longshot to naturally occur in our german shepherd breed, but was merely saying that perhaps "anything's possible"  Might even be a good thing to know that it could be done, that however we decide to screw up the gsd breed further down the road, scientific advances can lead to a reverseable solution to the problem.  Like I said, playing "devils's advocate," considering all the assumptions we take for granted.

keeping in mind that mice do not have the same colors, patterns and therefore not the same color genes as dogs, let alone German Shepherd Dogs, do.  Mice come in white - (black eyed and albino)  - spotted white, black, black with white belly, brown, brown with white belly, cream, cream with white belly - and every other color in between.  I don't think they come in "sable" or "agouti", or black/tan with saddle or blanket-back markings, or bicolor.  I doubt the color genes can really be compared between mice and GSDs - just as GSDs color genes would not be the same as those for Jack Russel terriers, or collies.  It's all very interesting, indeed.

I am only sure about my bicolor theory through my own breeding experience - but I am 100% sure that sables cannot be produced from two non-sable parents.  It is simple - sable is dominant and so producing it requires a sable gene - dogs with a sable gene are sable.  Really is that simple.

It would be far less of a surprise if the sable dog produced supposedly from two non-sable parents came from an oops breeding - that happens all the time.  If I were the breeder of such a dog, or someone looking to buy a dog from the parents (any of the dogs from that litter sable or not) - I would immediately turn to DNA to verify parentage, no question about that, because the fact is, it's simply not possible.

molly

I call it sable.  Now, show me a saddleback black/tan, sable, or bicolor mouse.  Do mice come with black muzzle?  (LOL) I'd guess that the genes for other breeds of dogs are closer to the GSD than the genes for mice - and other breeds of dogs carry completely different color genes, variations and markings.  It can get pretty complicated I'll bet - with chihuahuas who can come in any color under the sun including brindle and spotted - maybe gets more simple with breeds such as Kuvasz who come in only white.   GSDs are pretty simple compared to many breeds I think.

molly

Yeah sure, I'll just type up a couple chapters for you on complete/incomplete dominance.  Genes from other chromosome locations are going to affect the phenotypes, and by varying degrees.  Brindle markings for example, are actually aided by the agouti locus, which variably affects the phenotype.  I agree, the GSD is very simple, though we see many variations in coat expression.  This link shows on page 5, some of the gsd like patterns in mice, such as the dorsal stripe ("umbrous like") or the black-sable looking "severe LOF mutation".  It'd be interesting to see a bicolor mouse, but whatever controls that phenotype on a genetic level is absent to my knowledge in the mouse genome.