Coloring Question.

[x.WOLFiE.x]

Originally Posted by 1sttimeforgsd

He looks like my boy did when he was a youngster.
Ace at 20wks and his sisters. My baby's growing up.

Yes, exactly! What does he look like now???

nevermind. I just looked at your photos. Silly me. lol

[1sttimeforgsd]

I love bicolors, and I think that your boy is gorgeous. The brown will grow up his legs more but he will keep his pencil toes.

[Castlemaid]

Colouring like you describe on your pup has been called different things depending which school of thought you ask. I have heard it called Genetically black, with bleed-through. (Your pup is gorgeous by the way!). but then some people argue, that any amount of tan on a black makes it a bi-colour. The Bi's can be very melanistic meaning that they have large amounts of black pigment, almost making them look solid black, except for those areas of tan bleed through, like on your pup, and some of the pics posted.

So long answer above. Short answer is: your pup may be called a solid black with bleed-through, or a melanistic bi-colour, depending on who you ask.

One way that one could find out is to study the pedigree and see what the chances of colour inheritance are. However, some dogs that have been registered as solid black in the past may actually have been bi-colours with so little bleed-through colour that it was not noticed, so the pedigree alone may not be of much help.

I know there are some more knowledgeable people here with a deeper understanding of colour inheritance, so perhaps they can shed a bit of more light on the question.