i just think they're neat

northern domino, sighthound domino, or cocker spaniel domino? let's find out together. submissions are open!

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hi! sorry if this has been asked before, but if we have a genotyped dog with a phenotype that Does Not Match (at least to someone with a casual amount of knowledge) would that be something we could submit here/that this blog would be interested in? and if not, do you know one that might be a better fit?

yes absolutely! I'd love to see!

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The girls and i gotta know! He is down as an australian shepherd..?

Pretty dog! Most likely a black-based atypical (+) merle with ghost tan and moderate white spotting. Definitely a possible color for an Australian shepherd!

Kb/- at/- E(m)/- Ma+/m D/- B/- S/-

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people who are autistic about one specific thing make the world go round. thank u for ur service 🫡

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hi this isnt my dog but he also is, submitting my partner's sweet boy frankie frankenfurter (i dont remember his actual name. i think it was franklin)

Hi Frankie! Most likely a black-based brindle with moderate white spotting and roan/ticking.

kbr/- E(m)/- Ay/- B/- D/- S/- R/-

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Hello! This is Henry- he's a fawn basset fauve de bretagne. What would be his genetic colour? He's mostly orang, but he's also got a darker stripe down the middle of his back- is that caused by anything?

Henry 🥺🥺 I loooove the basset breeds! He looks to be a blue (dilute) sable:

ky/ky E/- Ay/- B/- d/d S/-

The stripe down the back might be a few different things. It could just be sable shading, which usually doesn't form such a clear stripe but is possible. It could also just be mostly textural - a weird shed or extra-intense guard hairs. Or it could possibly be minor CDA (color dilution alopecia), which often seems to affect the flank hairs more than the hairs along the back.

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Hello! What can you tell me about my girl Gracious-Dog (black/salt&pepper) and her brother Jack (white with spots)?

They are littermates; Australian Cattle Dog X Labrador mixes.

When Jack was a puppy he was mostly white with only the big black spots. I think every day he gets one new freckle. Grace has always been black with white ticking (??). Perhaps also of note, their white and black hair have distinctly different textures. The black is course and smooth, while the white is soft and fluffy.

Thanks! ❤️

Cute pups! Grace is black piebald with roan:

Kb/- (or ky/ky a/a) E(m)/- B/- D/- sp/sp R/-

And Jack is black piebald with ticking:

Kb/- (or ky/ky a/a) E(m)/- B/- D/- sp/sp

They are almost the same color - both are genetically black and piebald. Ticking/roan exists on a spectrum from just a few speckles to almost solid-colored; Grace just has much heavier roan than her brother.

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Hi there! This is my dear departed wonder-mutt Gracie. Her coloring always interested us, especially after getting her DNA test done (primarily mini poodle and Maltese with some dachshund). Any insight as to what kind of coloring she had? Thanks so much!

Sweet Gracie! She was a lovely black-based sable.

ky/ky E(m)/- Ay/- D/- B/- S/-

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Hello! I just stumbled upon your blog. It's really interesting! I'm terrible at dog genetics (better with cats).

Could I ask what coat colour/pattern this little guy is? He's not my dog, but a frequent escapee in my area. I think he's a Chihuahua x terrier of some kind. I have been calling him red and white or cream and white. I think the darker ears and fading of the fur elsewhere (he's not old, just faded, especially the face) is throwing me off.

He's black-based recessive red with moderate white spotting, so red & white/cream & white is correct!

e/e B/- D/- S/-

It's not uncommon for recessive red dogs to have darker ears - check out "white" Shiba Inu for a nice example of this. This is probably genetic but the cause is not known.

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Hi there! I've been wondering about the coloration of my mom's dog, Ivy, ever since we got her. Documents from different vet offices call her either a red merle or a blue merle, and I'm not sure either way! What's your opinion? According to embark, she's half Australian Shepherd and a quarter each Australian Cattle Dog and Boxer, if that helps at all.

Also, is there a term for her eye color? Thank you!

Lovely Ivy is a black tanpoint merle with moderate white spotting!

ky/ky at/- E(m)/- B/- D/- S/- M*/-

Some herding breeds call black merle or black tanpoint merle "blue merle", so while that's not super specific, it's not incorrect. "Red merle" usually refers to b/b brown merle, which she is not.

Dogs mostly don't have super specific eye color terms, but I'd probably call her eyes amber.

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HAH omg i didnt know there was already a blog like this. whoopsie. i only recently started to really understand dog genetics, so i made my blog as more of a fun not-quite-guessing game. i am curious, though, is there a reason you use "brown" over "liver" when talking about bb dogs? just a preference in terminology, or is "brown" something you think more people would understand vs "liver"?

We can never have too many blogs about dog coat color 🤝

And good question! Whenever possible I try to use the genetics literature terminology (with some exceptions). I use brown for b/b dogs because the locus is called the B-Locus (brown locus) and will show up that way on most test results folks might be looking at. But, right - b/b dogs are also variously called red, chocolate, or liver depending on breed.

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more of a general genetics ask, but what are considered the "wild-type" genes for dogs?

This is a really great question! The easy answer is basic grey wolf genotype - agouti (aw/aw), patterned (ky/ky), black eumelanin pigment (B/B, D/D), non-piebald (S/S), normal extension (E/E), and then of course non-merle, non-harlequin, etc.

If you're thinking about ancestral states though, the answer for the A-Locus is slightly more complicated. Grey wolves are not really the direct ancestor of dogs - instead both are descended from a now-extinct common ancestor. Arctic white wolves are genetically Ay/- sables, and there's some research to suggest that sable originated in the extinct common ancestor rather than in dogs. So, it's possible that the first dogs were sable rather than agouti.

Also as a side note - many grey wolves actually test as sp/sp (piebald), even though they are clearly not phenotypically piebald. We see this occasionally in dogs as well. The likely reason is that the site we're testing for isn't quite the causative site.

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Hello! This old man was my Nana and Grampy's dog for 20 1/2 long years. Do you know his phenotype?

Wow, 20.5 is impressive! He was black-based clear sable.

ky/ky E/- Ay/- B/- D/- S/-

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I am very curious about my dog (please let me know if this is the incorrect way to submit!)

His name is Charlie, but we almost named him Rusty because he has rust colored fur :) It’s hard to see from the picture but his ears are darker than everything else (+ as he got older his fur got lighter, it was much redder as a puppy)

Charlie is black-based recessive red with moderate progressive greying, and minor white spotting

e/e B/- D/- S/-

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Any idea on what my girl Bunny’s fur is like? When we adopted her she started as an almost all black Shiba, and now her face and legs are totally red. Also she is Shaped :3

Hi Bunny! She is shaped indeed, and is a black saddle tan with strong urajiro/countershading.

ky/ky ASIP^BS/- E/- D/- B/- S/-

Saddle tan dogs are born dark, and then the tan "creeps" as they grow - check out newborn vs. adult Airedales for a nice example.

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What are your insights into my Ellie? Really love the blog btw! It’s so cool to see you break the colors down.

Beautiful Ellie is one of my favorite colors - black-based brindle with minor white spotting! Like most "all brindle" dogs, she is genetically sable brindle.

She is quite heavily striped, and may have a mask as well - hard to tell for sure as she is pretty dark to begin with.

kbr/- Ay/- E(m)/- B/- D/- S/-

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just a little suggestion maybe: i think it might be helpful to indicate the s-locus a little more specifically. so instead of "black-based agouti piebald with ticking" something like "black-based agouti with ticking and piebald white spotting" idk figured it might be a bit more educational to those unfamiliar with how some phenotypes are classified.

and at least with cat genetics it's more common to indicate white spotting unless it's a breed-specific type. i.e. a cat with the Van white spotting is technically piebald but that isn't how it's referred to outside of white spotting grading, really. It'd either be referred to as Van or high white spotting.

maybe just my nitpicky autisticness but i think it could help point people in the right direction if they wanna go looking into it themselves. :)

Hey, thanks for your message! I'm always down to take suggestions, but I'm afraid I don't quite understand what you mean.

In dogs, piebald isn't a broad phenotype description but instead a specific genotype - it's the only form of white spotting that is testable in dogs (besides panda in GSDs). So when I describe a dog as piebald, what I mean is "a dog whose phenotype is consistent with the genotype sp/sp". So, this might be more of a difference in dog vs. cat terminology.

It's also common to describe a dog as (for example) a black piebald, rather than something like "black with piebald". There are lots of breed-specific terms as well (splash, color-headed white, particolor), but piebald is the genetic term so is what I use here.

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this is the dog I grew up with her name is lady and I miss her every day (she is in squirrel hell now). she was a mutt and we didn't know anything about her background. I would love to know her coloration ❤️

Hi Lady! ♥️ She was a masked black-based clear sable.

ky/ky Em/- Ay/- B/- D/- S/-