Red Merle

[Smudge]

Thing is, color is the first thing people see, but the last thing that ends up being important. Love changes things: when they bring home that flashy black or plain brown puppy who's an excellent fit for their family, they can't imagine why color was such a priority in the first place.

Yup. My family of "sable snobs" love Fluffy (a tri sheltie). My mom always said that she hated all other colors, because they didn't look like Lassie, and Lassie was the reason she was attracted to shelties in the first place. Guess who Fluffy's number one fan is (besides me)?

 

[k9kreationz]

Ohhh....this is so going to bug me. I swear I saw a red merle on someone's Sheltie webpage. That isn't to say the dog wasn't interbred somewhere else with something like an Aussie. But I just saw it. ARGH!!!

 

[vicky2]

You should find the link! I'm very curious now.

 

[MissSuzie]

Indeed. There are so many places where we can improve our breed, and make it even better - health, temperaments, structure, herding instinct - that color ends up pretty far down on the list of priorities.

It's funny, we get a lot of potential pet families who will call asking for a very specific sort of puppy... they want "Sable, with a white blaze and a full white collar" or "Tricolor, but with as little white as possible", or something equally exact. (I wonder if they think we can write the request down, wrap it around a cookie, and feed it to the bitch!) Thing is, color is the first thing people see, but the last thing that ends up being important. Love changes things: when they bring home that flashy black or plain brown puppy who's an excellent fit for their family, they can't imagine why color was such a priority in the first place.

Oh boy, you described me to a T here. My grand-doggers are both tri color shelties. When I decided to get a sheltie I wanted a tri-color as well. I thought the sable and white were too common. When I went to see the puppies, Meggie just stole my heart. My little sable girl is the most beautiful!!!! Now I wonder why I wanted a tri.

Then again, when I see the Fluffster..........................oh, my!

 

[Narmowen]

Ohhh....this is so going to bug me. I swear I saw a red merle on someone's Sheltie webpage. That isn't to say the dog wasn't interbred somewhere else with something like an Aussie. But I just saw it. ARGH!!!

Definitely not a purebred. Shelties do not have the red/liver gene that Aussie's do. They also shouldn't have the dilute gene (not to be confused with the merling gene) that causes the lilac color in Aussies, and blue in Weim's.

 

[Diana]

Just wanted to comment that this thread was an interesting read for me. I always thought that "sable" referred to the tan color. I didn't realize that it refers to the fact that each hair has a different-colored tip. I had noticed this about Buffy and figured maybe her hair will change when she gets older. I guess that's where the unique collie/sheltie coat come from! I think it is beautiful.

 

[BarbV]

A true red sable Sheltie will have almost the same colouring as the Red Aussie that was pictured.

It's not a mutation, but actually highly prized as it is fairly rare in American Shelties.

I'm no expert, but I suppose technically it would be possible to have a Red Sable Merle by breeding a pure for sable (red) to a blue merle.

Am I wrong here?

 

[Justicemom]

A true red sable Sheltie will have almost the same colouring as the Red Aussie that was pictured.

It's not a mutation, but actually highly prized as it is fairly rare in American Shelties.

I'm no expert, but I suppose technically it would be possible to have a Red Sable Merle by breeding a pure for sable (red) to a blue merle.

Am I wrong here?

If you breed a pure for sable to a blue merle or bi blue, you are essential breeding a sable to a black dog(masked but the merle gene) and you wil get a factored sable which will show the shading across the hair shaft(ie black tip and light base) not the uniform red of the Aussie. Also the red gene in Aussie effects the pigment of the nose,lips and eye rims producing a liver color instead of black. I suppose if you breed a pure for sable merle(very rare since most sable merles are from blue to sable breedings) to a pure for sable you might get something close.

 

[Bramblerose]

Both liver and maltese blues are genes present in the Sheltie breed, here is a picture of a red/liver sheltie-

http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/Genetics/Liver.html

There are many recessive colors in numerous breeds that are not accepted, or that there have been strong attempts to breed out, but they still show up from time to time. Shelties are a fairly young breed, so they defintely still carry recessives that can pop up.