Does a poodles character/temprament differ depending on the coat colour? I was just speaking to my neighbour who has always had black poodles and they are considering getting another I said what colour and she said "oh black we like the temprament of blacks" I asked her what she meant and she wasn't really sure what the other tempraments were but seemed convinced the colour made a difference. She has the minature poodles. The middle sized ones.

Karen

Can't specifically answer this one but I know, personally, I do believe colour is influencial on temperament in my own breed.  When you consider that all breeds came from different combinations in the first place I don't think it is beyond imagination that whatever dog brought whatever colour to a breed might also have brought some gene, perhaps forever connected, that carried some trait of his personality.

Ditto Isabel. In Goldens I notice a definite difference between colours, and in cats you can always predict temperament from coat colour.

I'm married to a redhead :)   Actually he is probably a good example of the exception that proves the rule being a very even tempered man, well he has to be doesn't he ;)

I always thought the middle sized ones were 'toy' poodles? I know we had a black toy poodle was I was a child, lovely dog he was :) I've met a couple of apricot poodles that have been a bit 'tetchy' for want of a better word. Could have just been the dogs themselves though and nothing to do with the colour?
I'm sure I've heard, could be wrong again, that theres a difference in characters between the brown and black newfies? But like I said, I could be wrong :P
I do know, different species I know, that my grey cockateils were always harder to tame (sp) than my yellow or cinnamon birds, (I still bear the scars ) whether they were males/females made no difference, but I'm sure the colour did :)

The smallest ones are the toy poodles, the medium sized are the miniatures and the big ones are the standard. :)

In the UK, the biggest Poodles are Standard, the middle size Miniature, and the smallest Toy. Within the FCI, it goes Standard, Middle, Dwarf and then Toy, so they have 4 sizes, and the FCI Toy Poodle is usually far smaller than the UK Toy Poodle.

Well I suppose I was thinking miniature as being really small :)
Learn something new every day I do :)
I love this site :P

Funny that!
I remember someone raising their eyebrows at another like mine, and saying oh well it is a blue and tan male you know!
Now I understand.
Karen  ;-)

>I'm sure I've heard, could be wrong again, that theres a difference in characters between the brown and black newfies?

Several Newfie breeders have told me the same thing...that browns are more 'challenging' than the black Funnily enough, everyone who has told me that have owned browns in the past but say they probably wouldn't have another. Now, why didn't anyone happen to mention this BEFORE I got a brown....? :D Next pup will be black so I'll see if there is a major difference for myself :)

Goldmali, can you provide a link regarding the temperment and coat colour of cats?  I am very curious.  Have four, two black, and I am always especially drawn to black cats.  And black horses.  Not black dogs even though Jet is black, though that is changing.

I don't know of any I'm afraid -it's just one of these things people in cats tend to learn about from exeperience , and I myself was taught it by the vet I worked for an I have found all she said to be totally true, and indeed I even mentioned colour temperament differences in some of my books.

Black cats are a bit of an odd one out because there you tend to get one or the other -either REALLY friendly cats, or REALLY unfriendly ones!

Black cats are a bit of an odd one out because there you tend to get one or the other -either REALLY friendly cats, or REALLY unfriendly ones!

That is soooo true, we have had two black cats, the first was the sweetest, friendliest cat in the world, the second a nightmare from H*ll who would attack without provocation.

We had a white toy he had an awesome temperament

We've always had white toys and they've all been the best natured, most loving little dogs you could ask for.

I've had a white miniature dog and currently have a red toy bitch - also 2 black miniatures within the family - fantastic natured all of them! The only thing I would say is that they tend to be 'a one person dog'! :)

Must say ditto on the one person dog ! Timmy would never leave my dads side followed him every where, sulked if he couldn't see him

Just waxing lyrical here, I wonder if recessive colours may have higher percentages of dodgy temperaments as it's harder to achieve that colour. That is, people are breeding dogs for appearance over temperament.

Sorry wrong post to reply too. :rolleyes:

I breed standard and miniature poodles, and when we were first looking into buying our first poodle, went to a breed show and asked a toy breeder about the colours, and he said that the blacks seems to be the most "steady"  (if you can say that about poodles) and as you went through the colours down to white then they tended to be more flighty.

I tend to think that yes it could depend on the size of the gene pool also.  The colours other than black in miniatures is decreasing considerably.  I breed silver miniatures and it is a constant struggle.

However, as I have and have had standards in black, blue, brown and white I have to say that I have not noticed any great difference in temperament.  Perhaps it is often down to how one brings up one's puppy.

Thank you all for your replies. Much appreciated.

We had a white minature poodle when I was a child and he wasn't a very nice dog, in fact he bit me in the face an unprovoked attack when I was 9 years old.  My grandparents used to breed them too (this is where we got ours from) and a couple of them were very temperamental.

I've noticed definite temperament differences within my own breed which is separated only by coat type and colour - the Blacks ( Groens) are far and away the easiest (calmest) of the four varieties - Tervs tend to be much more 'in your face' but the Malinois are the most active and fizziest of them all - they definitely need something to keep them occupied - can't speak about Laekenois as I've had little to do with them but they appear to be quite easy going

Yvonne