I love the Lurcher Blue. Is he in the East Dave as I'm sure I saw either him or a dog very similar being walked near by. I recognised the string for a lead....

-- Edited by Amanda at 16:37, 2006-07-04

Sunny girl wrote:

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Have you had a job lot of blacks again Dave a few of them look really similar

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Hi Landess, yeah it's just the same dog taken from 7 different angles......Black is the most 'dominant' gene colour in Greyhounds, here's something that was posted both on the Greyhound Data and Global Greyhound forums last month, v. interesting....

1. All dogs inherit genes in pairs, one from their sire and one from their dam;

2. Every gene has an action;

3. Here we are dealing only with dominant and recessive genes. Only one dominant gene need be inherited to show its action, two recessive genes must be inherited to show theirs. If only one recessive gene is inherited, although it will not show its action, it is still a part of the dog's genes and can be passed on to any offspring.

4. There is an order of dominance in coat colour. Black is the most dominant, only one gene need be inherited for a dog to be black. Brindle is a dominant gene and only one gene need be inherited for a dog to be brindle but if a dog inherits both a black and a brindle gene it will still be black because black is dominant over brindle. Fawn is a recessive gene and so two fawn genes need to be inherited for a dog to be fawn, if a dog inherits two fawn genes and one brindle gene it will be brindle, because brindle is dominant over fawn.

5. Blue is really a diluted black dog. For a dog to be born blue it must inherit at least one black gene but two dilution genes, because the dilution gene is recessive.

6. In coat colour inheritance, many genes inherited by a dog can be established merely by observation. For instance if a dog is black, we know he obviously carries at least one black gene;

If a dog is blue we know he carries at least one black gene and two dilution genes;
If a dog is white and something, we know he carries two white genes because white is recessive.
If a dog is fawn we know he carries two fawn genes but no brindle genes,
If a dog is brindle we know he carries two fawn genes and at least one brindle gene.

All genes are inherited in pairs, so if a dog is brindle or fawn we know the two colour genes they inherited are fawn, we also know the fawn inherited two non-brindle genes, we know that the brindle dog inherited at least one brindle gene but we don't know if it's gene pair was brindle or non-brindle.

If a dog is blue we know it inherited one black gene, but we don't know what it's pair is, we also know it inherited two dilution genes, we don't know if it inherited brindle or non brindle genes or how many, we don't know if it inherited any white and ? genes.

So how can we find out what hidden or recessive genes are carried by them? By their offspring of course. If a black dog produces fawn or white and ? offspring, they obviously carry a recessive gene for that colour, because the dam can only give one of the pair of genes needed for it to show its action and the sire gives the other one, so if a pup is born fawn or white and ? he obviously inherited one gene for that colour from his sire, in which case the sire must carry it.

If a black sire produces brindle offspring to a brindle bitch, we cannot assume he carries the brindle gene because only one of the inherited gene pair need be brindle for it's action to show and obviously the dam being brindle could have given that brindle gene to the offspring. BUT if a black dog produces brindle when mated to a fawn bitch it is him who must have passed on the brindle gene because a fawn cannot carry it.

Laura wrote:

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 I really hope to hear some news about Jacky soon as he was my favourite boy, such a beauty!

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Hi Laura, I posted an explanation of Jacky's disappearing act on the Galaxy Defender thread...

Dave, thanks for the explanation about genes and their relationship to the colours of the dogs it's as clear as mud now !

blue, is a bit of a hunk, nice beard !
fergus, looks so forlorn, bless him
brock, ever so much like my daisy - they'd be peas in a pod
sprite, needs much tlc, which i'm very good at
tommy, looks like a big softie which melts my heart
louie, very handsome boy and looks intelligent
banjo, another handsome boy and a lovely colour

i need a huge lottery win to buy a bigger house with an attached field - keep yer fingers crossed for wednesday's draw!!!

seriously tho, they are all lovely and i hope they find their forever homes soon.

Thanks Dave for the Gene data.  It's interesting!! 

silverhippo wrote:

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OK with the genes thing, how do you get a blue brindle like Zak then?  

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erm.....

 

I've just noticed Decon is Sunnys half brother  

He is lovely, Dave he looks Blue in the picture I thought he was black when I met him. He's got the family white nose anyway.

Landess Sunny and Zoe

I've just had another look at the retired greyhound database and on the GAL site there is a gorgeous girl called Annie (baytown fawn), can anyone tell me where she is and why she is not on the main GAL adoption pages? She seems to have been available for a long time for such a beautiful girl, I would have thought she would have been homed easily.