How dark could Ida's fur get?

[HopeShelties]

My Aurora is a sable from blue to sable and very dark, rich tri factored sable. My other is granddaughter of a sable merle. Bright, clear pumpkin orange. Lark's brother was a nice, clean blue merle and he was out of blue to sable. And I knew Duke, so can vouch for him being a nice, clean blue.
I think that whole bit about muddied colors is just a bunch of nonsense. There was a discussion about it on a facebook group recently. I was amazed by the number of long time breeders who believed that. It seemed those who bred strictly sables tended to believe it more often than those with aoacs.
IMO, degenerate, faded colors tend to produce more of the same. Clean, correct colors bred to others with clean correct color, whether it be sable x sable, tri/bi to sable, tri/bi to blue, blue to sable, or sable merle to any of those combinations, if using nicely colored dogs should produce nicely colored dogs. If a less desirable color (faded, rusty, muddied) pops up, it has something to do with the color genetics behind one, or both of the parents. Not anything to do with what two particular colors were bred together.

 

[Tabitha]

Just thought I'd post an updated picture of Ida's shading. Her fur has gotten a little darker over the past 5 months, she's almost 15 months old now. I have a feeling she'll get much darker within the next year. The first pic is back in July, the second is after a bath today.

 

[EJHUNTL]

this is an excellent color explanation- complete with lots of pix

Thanks for this - I've bookmarked it. I'm loving watching Hanna's colours develop. She had quite a bit of dark as a puppy but that almost disappeared by the time she was 4 months - now I can see it start to come back, especially on her right side. She is a sable merle that is easy to spot as the shading is still quite visible.

I'm going to be posting Hanna Monday week 30 in a few minutes and there will be some close ups that show the dark hairs coming through.

I don't think there's any breed that is quite as spectacular as the sheltie when it comes to colour variations.

 

[BarbV]

It really depends.....Bacca started going dark and then suddenly he started to go more red sable.

My forever pup, Timber, started light but ended up a mahoghony sable.

Bottom line, until about 2-3 years, you can keep guessing. I think the only colours that will stand true are tri's......

 

[Justicemom]

It really depends.....Bacca started going dark and then suddenly he started to go more red sable.

My forever pup, Timber, started light but ended up a mahoghony sable.

Bottom line, until about 2-3 years, you can keep guessing. I think the only colours that will stand true are tri's......

The AOACs(blue and black dogs) don't really change color like the sables. The blues may darken some but they pretty much same the same pattern.