Sheltie/Collie Coloring

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Lightplum

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So I was reading the Genetic testing thread on how people are always telling the non sable color owners that it cant be a pure breed sheltie because its not sable etc...and Shelli brought up a point that was interesting and I never noticed in all my time showing...I havent seen a Bi-blue Collie and never noticed!:eek2:
So this lead me to my question where does the Sheltie Bi-blue come from???? I always took it for granted that all their coloring came from the Collies...
 
Interesting question! I did some quick research, and it seems there may not be a sure answer? The ASSA site says:


"There are suspicions and rumors of crosses with other breeds. Unknown for certain is where the blue, either bi-blue, or blue merle with tan had its beginnings."

http://www.assa.org/SheltieHistory.html
 
Lightplum said:
So I was reading the Genetic testing thread on how people are always telling the non sable color owners that it cant be a pure breed sheltie because its not sable etc...and Shelli brought up a point that was interesting and I never noticed in all my time showing...I havent seen a Bi-blue Collie and never noticed!:eek2:
So this lead me to my question where does the Sheltie Bi-blue come from???? I always took it for granted that all their coloring came from the Collies...
Click to expand...

A cousin of my husband's has a blue merle collie. :smile2:

I haven't got a clue where the merling gene came from.
 
You are correct, Collies do not have the bi-color allele to produce black and white and bi-blue dogs. There was a bi-black Collie once, but the lineage was suspect, just like the brindle Sheltie. I think it's entirely likely that the Collies had that gene at some point, but purposefully bred away from it? :confused2:

http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/genetics/ColorGen.html

"Finally, at least two breeds (Shetland Sheepdog and German Shepherd) have a fully recessive black. Since black is the bottom recessive of the A series in many other mammals, it seems logical to assign this color to recessive black, a, and state that recessive black is caused by aa at the agouti locus. There is an alternative theory in Shelties which suggests the existence of a recessive gene that removes tan points from a genetic black and tan or a dominant, widespread gene that forms tan points on all colors but dominant black."
 
That is quite interesting about the bi-factor in the collie. I actually never knew that. :razz: You learn something new every day.
 
Way back then, when breeds were still developing, different breeds were crossed with one another. That's why we have such a diversity of breeds of all shapes, colors, and sizes.

I'm sure whatever breeds were being crossed caused some sort of dilution of colors, making the tan pigment fade away. Or maybe they caused the tan to completely cancel out. But don't quote me, I'm just guessing :lol: I'm sure a genetics fan could come up with some kind of answer.
 
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