Coat Color Related Question

I've been chewing on this a bit, and finding no logical answer.

How and why are "acceptable" colors within a breed established? I
understand the necessity to specify that some colors are DQ due to potential
color linked health problems (like problems with breeding merles and
piebalds). But what about the rest? Is it aesthetics, history, what?

Suja

"Suja" <spanaval.TakeThisOut@scs.gmu.edu> wrote in
news:kzqAg.84941$ZW3.67471@dukeread04:

> How and why are "acceptable" colors within a breed established? I
> understand the necessity to specify that some colors are DQ due to
> potential color linked health problems (like problems with breeding
> merles and piebalds). But what about the rest? Is it aesthetics,
> history, what?

In many cases it is history. Most modern dog breeds are based on a certain
local dog population, a landrace. In the time of very little travelling a
local dog population normally came in just a rather small selection of
colors. Sometimes they were the colors which were best suited to a certain
use, and sometimes they just happened to be what they were.

When modern, standardized dog breeds were "created", these local
populations had most often started to get mixed with other dogs. Looks,
especially color was then one easy way to decide which dogs most probably
had foreign blood and couldn't be registered, and which ones were more
likely pure or nearly pure.

In some cases a breed was created more or less by one person, and in these
cases whatever that person liked might have had a very heavy effect on the
written standard.

And then some local populations were very variable, multicolor. But the
older idea of "being purebred" includes a very high level of homozygoity.
One certain dog type was selected for one reason or other, and just the
dogs which resembled this "ideal dog" could be registered. A very small
selection of colors, perhaps just ONE, is one part of that "idea".

A couple of examples from Finnish breeds.

There are hundreds of years old texts, which tell about weird people living
in snowy Finnish forests, skiing and hunting - and having special fox-like
red dogs with them. There really has been a very common landrace here in
Finland, a smallish hunting spitz which came in several colors but solid or
nearly solid yellow/red was a common color. Perhaps even most common color
in some areas. So, when all kinds of "this is our own National Stuff" was
hip all over Europe during the end of 19th century, the very first Finnish
dog breed was created from the remnants of local pure landrace dog
populations. That dog was naturally going to be fox-colored little spitz -
and that's what our national breed looks today.

Finnish Hound is one of the best hare and fox hunters there are. It isn't a
landrace breed, but it is based on mixes between Swedish hounds, German
hounds, British Foxhound and Russian hounds imported here during 18th and
19th century. Instead of just creating a horde of local hound types (like
French and Swiss did), hunting clubs decided to write a uniform standard
and breed towards it. The followed the idea of "one breed, one
color/pattern" and decided that tan body, black saddle and no white was the
way to go. They soon noticed that those pesky white markings kept on
popping up in several really good dogs, and they decided to change the
standard to "tan body, black saddle AND irish white pattern". That has been
the only accepted color/pattern for well over 100 years now.

Then Lapponian Herder, an ancient dog type but a very recent (1960's)
addition to the world of kennel club accepted breeds. When it was first
"created", a small sub-population of Herders from Menesjarvi village area
was chosen as the "ideal type": certain looks, certain tail carriage, and
black tanpoint color, and the standard was written according to them. But
luckily the time was more open, and soon a larger selection of types and
especially colors were accepted. But as Sami reindeer herding folks on many
regions had preferred dark dogs, the standard was written so that about
every color and pattern is ok, as long as the dog is mainly dark: black,
grey or any shade of brown, with or without pale/tan or white markings.

Liisa