Were black dalmatians around before liver dally's, if so how did they produce the liver colour, or visa versa if liver dally's came first.

I breed and show black and chocolate dalmation cavies (guinea pigs) and in my breed the blacks came first, and all the other colours (there are 9 different colours all together) came after them.

So i was just wondering how the different colours were produced, otherwards what breed did you put into them to get the colour you wanted.

This is just out of interest you understand, i have no other motive for asking. :)

As black is the dominant gene I would imagine that came before the recessive liver; that's generally considered to be the mutation.

A mutation?  did a liver puppy just pop up in a black litter then.?

Dalmation cavies came about by one popping up in a self black litter and it went on from there, that was over 25 years ago and i was in it from the beggining.

Who knows? The colour has been known about for as long as the breed has been written about - the details would be lost in the mists of time. A couple of hundred years ago, when our long-established breeds were still being developed and 'improved', dalmatains and pointers were occasionally interbred, and there are the same colour variations in pointers as in dalmatians ... perhaps it came from there.

Addition: the accepted colours were mentioned as being black or liver in "The Illustrated Book of the Dog" by Vero Shaw in 1881, so it was well established then.

Well that is how it ahppens in Rabbits.  there was an interesting lady in the Rabbit fancy who set out to prove by breddign wild buns that you woudl eventually get the mutaions in colour and then by breeding itno the mutaion establish them.

In Rabbits wild colour agouti is dominat, then you get black pop out quite readily, then blue etc.

Hm, some wild populations of rabbits have a lot of blacks in them.  I remember seeing a few down in Cornwall years ago, then there's a population near a motorway just outside of Ashford in Kent that has a lot of black rabbits.  I used to see them every day on the way home from work.

I'd be interested to know where the other colour mutations in dallies spring from - the lemon, brindle, tricolour - are they diluted forms of the liver (for the lemon) or something else?  I'm thinking along the lines of dobes here, with the fawns being dilute red and the blues being dilute black.  Is it something similar or a different genetic mechanism at work?

Fascinating stuff genetics :)

In dals lemon and orange spotting is due to a variant of the regular black or liver genes which affects hair colour and not skin pigmentation - in lemons the nose pigment is black, and in oranges the nose pigment is liver. (Confusingly they're the other way around in the US!) I would imagine that blue is a dilute black.

It's interesting that English setters have similar colour patterns and variations (and are also born white, apart from the patches, which are acceptable in their standard), as well as pointers still allowing blacks, livers, oranges and lemons. There must surely have been some crossbreeding back in the depths of history.

As you say, genetics is a fascinating subject.

Intriguing stuff!

A little off-topic, sort of, but an old boss of mine mentioned that I think somewhere near London there was a woman who rescues the unusual colours from being culled when they pop up in litters - is that true, do you know?

Pure curiosity :)

Not as far as I know. You don't know what colour the pups will be (other than black or liver from the noses) for a couple of weeks, and most people register the non-standard pups, whether from colour or patches, and endorse the registrations. Nobody would hand over a two-week old pup to a 'rescue'.

Makes sense, that boss was always prone to stretching the truth a little :p

It is probably lost in the mists of time, as after all they all evolved from the Wolf.  Also colour inheritance varies in different species though some colours behave the sme regardless.  Blue is dilute black, fawn dilute or brown etc.

With Cavies (guinea pigs) if you mate a pure black with a pure golden you would get golden agouti, which looks like the wild colour, and not as you would think some babies black and some babies golden.

I find genetics interesting, and i didnt know there were other colours of dalmatian dogs other than the ones i have mentioned.

I like dalmatian dogs they are a very striking breed, in fact i like all animals with spots, rabbits, mice, horses, and of course my breed dalmation cavies. :)

Doesnt the Bull Terrier have dalmation bred into it?

Yes, according to all the bull terrier breed histories I've read.

Ahh!

Thats where theyre stance comes from I believe, hard to fathom isnt it really!

And they whould be BAER hearing tested too, but few seem to be   We ahve a white bull terrier cross at trainign class that is completely deaf, and I don't think his owner will go the distance with him :rolleyes: