Sable color? - Page 2

Hundmutter, within hours of birth, dry but still plenty of new puppy smell. Any older and they are already changing color :) mant go through a fawn type stage, ring around the tail, before they get dark again.

All litters that included sable pups I have known
from birth have been out of sable dams [both
mid-grey, for want of a better description] to black
& gold sires. (Seen many more at 6 or 7 weeks,
or older, though). It has been extremely uncommon
for sable to be bred to sable here in the UK (although
that may be beginning to change nowadays).

Most pups I've seen when that young have grown darker
as they have aged, though there have been exceptions
so that isn't universally true. And quite often the difference
has been minimal, as they were not very light/pale when
born.

It is often said on this board that sable pups are the same
colour just after birth as they finally wind up when mature;
even if they go through a variety of colour stages while they
are growing up. - As this isn't wholly an experience I can
concur with, I have taken it that this 'fact' applies more to
sable x sable breedings. Anybody got 'whole life' experience
from BOTH types of matings, who could confirm one way or
the other ?

I've done a few b&tan/black to sable/black and sable/b&t to black, only one sable/b&t to sable/black.

My guys have all followed the back to birth color scheme, after going through a lighter stage. I'll have to find some pictures (aka, firing up the dinosaur pc later :)

Thx Melba, I begin to think that the clue is in if there is black lineage behind sable or b&g dogs;  as neither of the bitches

I was that familiar with carried all-black behind them,  that

wouldn't apply to how their coats were pigmented,  so perhaps that is why they could go from quite light at birth to considerably darker when mature ?

Hope those dinos didn't eat the pics you are looking for ! LOL

gorgeous pup!!!!

Beautiful puppy for sure! She had black striping on her toes. In my experience (have two dark sable dogs), they get darker up until the age of three. I think yours will wind up a dark sable. Keep us posted!

None of which explains this: (sorry, no pics or links
available)
The 2nd bitch to which I have referred above was much
the colouring of the winning boy in Fry's link ^^^, maybe
slightly lighter grey. She'd had one previous litter before
the two lots I saw born. These dogs (of which several
were kept into adulthood) were about 18 mths when I first
set eyes on them. Different B&R sire from the next two.

While all her sable pups from the 3 litters were more reddish
than dark grey in the 'not black tipped' parts of their coats
[ie underlying body colour, legs, face markings] they were
all but one 'normal looking' sables. One of the 18 mth
females however was already - and stayed - an extremely
pale sable. She had all the black tippings, pencil marks, etc
but really light in tone, not 'black' black, if you see what I mean;
and her coat overall was a sort of speckled pale toffee colour.
All the B&R pups from all 3 litters were quite heavily black or
blanket marked, (dam had very noticeable blanket-backed
ancestry ) so colour paling as we normally know it does
not seem to apply. Melba / anyone got any thoughts on this ?