Gundog Training Forum

anybody with information about white marks on labs? a lab pup i have has a white mark on one of his feet, his litter brother has white on three of his.

Have a read here
http://labradornet.com/bolopads.html

very interesting ,went on pedigree database and can trace pup bacck to banchory bolo c1915! I would have thought the trait would have been so diluted by now as to be almost non existent.

My lab has a white patch on his chest and his toes have gone increasingly white with age. He's nearly fourteen now though so I don't know whether it's grey or white

That's interesting canismajor, my Lab has a white stripe on the back of both legs just above his paws. How did you find the pedigree database? Would like to see if my Lab goes back to Bolo. Judy mentioned it to me ages ago about Bolo.

Jelinga

They supposedly go back to Banchory Bolo, the dual champion, and are small white spots under the feet, they can also come up the back of the pastern as well. They're not mentioned in the BS at all, but seem to be allowed by show judges. Tau has them, in the middle of the underside of her paws.



As well as the allowable medallion, another white mark Labs commonly get is a ring around their tail, about a third of the way along. Not seen one myself but it seems to be something commonly reported.

Go all the way back to the St.John's dog they had white on them like some of your dogs do.

There are a number of other breeds in the labs ancestry. The original Small St. John's Dog was indeed the founding father of the lab but when imported it was reported as being , "swift to run, swift to fight." To "improve" upon the St.John's Dog other breeds were used ........ almost certainly pointer, flatcoat, curly coat ,maybe collie and maybe foxhound too.
Throw backs to those breeds do happen. They happen in colour and they happen, to some extent in "type." I have trained a pure bred black,tan and white lab as a guide dog and I have seen a few others ..... and I do mean a few...... that the breeders did not knock on the head at birth to protect their "names." A quick knock on the head was the fate of yellow lab pups for quite some time.

A google search of something like "Labrador colour oddities" should show you the range of colours and of markings possible in the labrador breed. I have seen pics of brindles, black and tans, black tan and whites and snowflake or snowdrop marked labradors . These are black labs with lots of white markings including white ears.

Wullie

Anyone interested in these topics could do far worse than read copies of the books [‘Dual Purpose Labrador’ and ‘Advanced Labrador Breeding’.] by Mary Roslin Williams [ Mansergh] http://www.notonlyblack.it/mary-roslin- ... manserghs/

I can add to the white tail ring its true it can or could/can be found on Black Labradors by holding the tail tip and gently running your other hand up the tail against the lay of coat/hair part way up could be found a ring of white hairs about 2 or more inches thick.
By casual observation it wasn’t noticeable except for at times if a dog was laying down and the underside tail was exposed a glimpse is about all you could see .Often these tails were traditional otter type with an underside parting.
The coat on these dogs is denser and easily notable it’s a thick double coat compared to most Labs, much of the hairs at base/skin level were also white. A lab with these coats are about as waterproof as can be, talk about water off a ducks back these coats are exceptional for the working purpose in comparison to average coats. We had these white ring tails genuine double coats in dogs with the following lines. Drakeshead mark,,Gallowmill brigg,Bekesbourne and spudtamsons,Palgrave/eyebrook. Hopefully theres still a few about but many modern day trial dogs don’t have it and it tends to be easily lost in breeding with modern lines.

Jelinga wrote:That's interesting canismajor, my Lab has a white stripe on the back of both legs just above his paws. How did you find the pedigree database? Would like to see if my Lab goes back to Bolo. Judy mentioned it to me ages ago about Bolo.

Jelinga

try www.pedigreedatabase.com/