Gideon's girl Posted April 9, 2014 Report Share Posted April 9, 2014 True, but not necessarily all over the body. Much of the body can be golden without any shading, or striping, of the hair. A sable will have at least some areas of shading, usually across the shoulders, around the eyes and some on the tail, but it can vary from just a little (like my lurcher Tansy) to quite a lot, making them appear almost black. Carole Presburg has a good description and pictures on her Border Collie Museum site: http://www.bordercolliemuseum.org/BCLooks/Sable/Sable.html. True, all the sables I have had had tan markings with no black at all and some areas where the black was solid too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GentleLake Posted April 9, 2014 Report Share Posted April 9, 2014 True, all the sables I have had had tan markings with no black at all and some areas where the black was solid too. AFAIK, to be a sable the dog must have some black, or at least black shading, i.e. banded hairs. Were the ones with solid black areas in a saddle pattern? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gideon's girl Posted April 9, 2014 Report Share Posted April 9, 2014 Shoulder bars and a bar across the top of the head. I never had any with a saddle pattern. They were GSDs, not BCs, but the sable gene is the same. When I said tan markings with no black, I meant that they had tan where a tri would have tan that was not sable marked hair, and they had black hairs that were not sable(barred). Not that they had no black anywhere on their body, that's definitely not sable. My dogs generally had tan, gray, and black bars on all the sable hair, except the really short hair on the face and legs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Donald McCaig Posted April 10, 2014 Report Share Posted April 10, 2014 Dear Doggers, How is hair color pertinent to a forum on stockdog training? Donald McCaig Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pam Wolf Posted April 10, 2014 Report Share Posted April 10, 2014 Twitch looks a lot like my first BC. She was described (way back when) by Sally Lacy as "Old Hemp" coloration. she did produce true sable pups (not the saddleback type). The colour was called old hemp because it was the way old marine rope looked. The ropes would be covered with tar to protect them and underneath the hemp would show. On old hemp ropes (rope was made of hemp then, not smoked so much ) the weathered hemp would show through the black tar, hence the name "old Hemp" And Mr. McCaig, it has no relevance to working dogs. A bit late here, but I try to encourage all owners of pups to teach bite inhibition (check out www.dogstardaily.com ) it gives you a safety valve so to speak for those times when the dog during it's life may feel the need to bite a human (which can be many depending on the dog). Dogs bite, that is a fact. by teaching bite inhibition, they can learn how to use the bite to warn instead of damaging people who are hurting them: such as kids or adults unwittingly or in helping the dog when it gets tangled in the fence when jumping it, or the vet putting the dislocated shoulder back into place. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gideon's girl Posted April 10, 2014 Report Share Posted April 10, 2014 Dear Doggers, How is hair color pertinent to a forum on stockdog training? Donald McCaig Dear Mr. McCaig Since toy policy in the house is not about training stockdogs, and I go to every post from recent comments, not the individual forums, I had no idea we were even in the Working Stockdogs "training discussions" area. I'm so sorry we got off topic in an already off topic post. I'm not sure how carefully I'll watch for that sort of thing in the future, since I go about it in an apparently bass ackward way, but I will try. Patty Vaughn Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Maralynn Posted April 10, 2014 Report Share Posted April 10, 2014 As long as the dog is bred for work then why not discuss/enjoy color when it pops up? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GentleLake Posted April 10, 2014 Report Share Posted April 10, 2014 ^^Agreed. And I can understand the OP's curiosity when the color was turning into something unexpected. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pam Wolf Posted April 11, 2014 Report Share Posted April 11, 2014 If like I do, and I am sure others do the same, we come to the boards and read the latest posts and have no idea which forum in which any post is, and in the long run is it that big a deal? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cwb3 Posted April 11, 2014 Report Share Posted April 11, 2014 Puppy pics make any forum that much better! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
medic09 Posted April 11, 2014 Report Share Posted April 11, 2014 My only working dog was a big yellow Lab SAR dog. A toy was often a reward after making a find. Nonetheless, our house has dog toys all over the place (we have three dogs). The 'reward toy' was kept separate and only used for training and work. Now that the old boy is gone, I've kept that idea for playing with our BC pup. He has free access to the general dog toys; but when I want to train him (just general commands for now) then one of the special toys can come out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyingcircleg Posted April 11, 2014 Author Report Share Posted April 11, 2014 My only working dog was a big yellow Lab SAR dog. A toy was often a reward after making a find. Nonetheless, our house has dog toys all over the place (we have three dogs). The 'reward toy' was kept separate and only used for training and work. Now that the old boy is gone, I've kept that idea for playing with our BC pup. He has free access to the general dog toys; but when I want to train him (just general commands for now) then one of the special toys can come out. Thats a fantastic idea. I know a friend of mine thats a LEO does that with his dutch shepard k9 unit.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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