Liisa I asked you several months ago about the so-called stag red in Min
Pins. I finally have the coat color genetics figured out, so in case
you're interested--this is mostly from someone on one of the Min Pin lists.

Min Pins come in two different "red" types--clear red, which is red with
no other coat color, and "Stag" red, which is red with black
intermingling hairs. Min Pins also come in all four of the colors that
Dobermans come in--black, brown (called chocolate in Min Pins), blue,
and lilac (isabella fawn). All four of those colors have tan points.

Okay, let me see if I get this right.

The stag red Min Pin is actually sable, AyAy or AyAt. AtAt is tanpoint,
so if two AyAt dogs are mated, some offspring may be AtAt. And AtAt
offspring will express the next part of the color series, BB (Bb, bb)
and DD (Dd, dd). The interesting thing is that the sable will express
the underlying B/D series in its overlaying hairs. So Min Pin sable can
be sable/black, sable/brown, sable/blue, sable/lilac. A picture of a
sable/blue dog can be found on this page, http://www.prancealot.com/.
It's the dog at the top right on the first page. Top left is lilac,
middle top and bottom left is brown, bottom right is blue. Awful
website, I wouldn't try to wade in much further if I were you.

Finally, all Min Pins do carry the EE/Ee series, so clear red min pins
are ee yellow, and may come from any color combination though, of
course, ee to ee will only produce ee.

As you can tell this has been bugging the heck out of me and I feel *so*
much better now I've figured it out! Now there was apparently a
harlequin somewhere back in the woodpile but those are supposed to be
extinct. I've seen one photograph, but the breeder also happens to breed
merled Poms and boy does that puppy look fuzzy-haired in the picture...

Robin Nuttall wrote in
news:q0JKh.20807$y92.2480@attbi_s22:

The stag red Min Pin is actually sable, AyAy or AyAt. AtAt is tanpoint,
so if two AyAt dogs are mated, some offspring may be AtAt.

Correct. And the more black/dark shading there is, the more likely it is
that its genotype is Ayat and not AyAy.

And AtAt
offspring will express the next part of the color series, BB (Bb, bb)
and DD (Dd, dd). The interesting thing is that the sable will express
the underlying B/D series in its overlaying hairs. So Min Pin sable can
be sable/black, sable/brown, sable/blue, sable/lilac.

Yup, the effect of B/b and D/d is easiest to see on tanpoint (atat) dogs,
but it can be seen on sables too. Even when there are very little dark
hairs in the adult coat, the nose color will reveal that B/b D/d.

Finally, all Min Pins do carry the EE/Ee series, so clear red min pins
are ee yellow, and may come from any color combination though, of
course, ee to ee will only produce ee.

Actually most "clear reds" in this breed are sables too. Sable dogs can be
totally clear, especially when they are homozygous for the sable allele Ay,
and it is possible that there are totally NO dark hairs in the adult coat,
just whiskers are dark. Puppy coat has always some shading even when adult
coat is totally clear.

But there really are ee dogs in this breed, although the "traditional color
list" of this breed doesn't mention them. They seem to be more common in
USA than in Europe, but they are found from European bloodlines too - and
they actually might be far more common than most breed fanciers think.

ee pups are always pure, solid tan or yellow when born, no black/dark hairs
anywhere, and they are easiest to tell apart from sables at that age. They
have always pale (no darker than red) whiskers, and they have sometimes
non-black nose even if they are genetically black-pigmented B- D-. ee dogs
have also on average more white than EE/Ee dogs. I saw a photo of a Min Pin
litter with two ee pups, which both had minor white spotting, and all their
E- siblings were totally solid.

As you can tell this has been bugging the heck out of me and I feel
*so* much better now I've figured it out!

Hey, now you are ready to attack the colors of a more difficult breed :-)

Now there was apparently a
harlequin somewhere back in the woodpile but those are supposed to be
extinct.

There was never merle in registered Min Pins, but there was a closely
related small Pinscher breed in Germany, Harlequin Pinscher, during the
first part of 20th century. They most likely went totally extinct during
WWII or soon after it, and during early 1960's or so FCI announced that
none have been registered for ages and officially removed that breed from
their list of accepted dog breeds. I think that Harl Pin is the only FCI
breed which has ever went extinct.

I don't know if Harl Pins had the real harlequin pattern seen in Danes, but
they had at least merle. I've seen some drawings of them.

I've seen one photograph, but the breeder also happens to
breed merled Poms and boy does that puppy look fuzzy-haired in the
picture...

Well, there shouldn't be merle Poms either... For some reason they just
started popping up in American kennels, and the first ones looked a little
like Shelties. Sure this "merle Min Pin" is a mutt, no matter what its
papers tell. If such a dog is officially registered, the breed club should
make its breeder to prove its parentage by DNA testing.

Liisa

Liisa Sarakontu wrote:

Well, there shouldn't be merle Poms either... For some reason they just
started popping up in American kennels, and the first ones looked a little
like Shelties. Sure this "merle Min Pin" is a mutt, no matter what its
papers tell. If such a dog is officially registered, the breed club should
make its breeder to prove its parentage by DNA testing.


I agree. The woman who produces them gets very hostile about it though
so I'm not going there!

Thanks for the info and the clarification on ee versus AyAy. And heck no
I'm not ready for more complex colors, this is hard enough! Dobermans
are *much* easier!