Thursday, February 4, 2010

Color My Dog

So, if you were someone, not unlike me, who owned a dog, not unlike Kate, what would you call her color?

For the sake of simplicity, I usually just go with B&W. Although, she’s not black and white and I don’t really know what to call her.

It doesn’t help that her color changes with the lighting.
She is my mood ring dog.

Here is a smattering of pics I chose that show her color in various lights.

DSC_8938

DSC_0261

DSC_1681

DSC_2296

DSC_2682

DSC_3115

DSC_5036

Your thoughts?

24 comments:

  1. I would call her beautiful.

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  2. She's sable. When used as an adjective it means brownish black. The word conveys to me a much richer color description than saying brownish black.

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  3. She is just perfect. Love the tongue sticking out.

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  4. I'm pretty sure she's seal. Look here http://www.bryningbordercollies.com/Border-Collie-Colours

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  5. Seal is a variation of sable, but sable dogs are of a lighter color.

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  6. The first thing that popped into my head was "seal"

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  7. I was actually going to say agouti, which is basically sable. If you go further, the color is generally referred to, like others said, as seal. Whatever color she is, she's gorgeous.

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  8. I would say sable as well. I had a ferret that looked just like her in color. My border collie/aussie mix pup is a reddish brown and white.. but your dogs color is more sable... she is beautiful!!

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  9. I'd say white and brownish black. I never know the proper "dog colours" phrases.

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  10. I would say that she is sable.

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  11. I agree. Sable and white! Love her coloring, BTW.

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  12. I vote for "seal and white". Not that you asked for a vote. LOL

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  13. I was going to say seal and white as well. "Sable" is not really a color, more of a pattern, and is therefore not very specific.. there are all kinds of colors of sable. Seal implies a color, and if someone doesn't know what it is, tell them she's the color of a seal! : P

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  14. Black and white and gray and a little of this...
    Benny & Lily

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  15. Pretty dog, that's the color.

    I think seal.

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  16. Sable specifically means that there are two separate colors on a hair -- a paler base and a black tip (on a genetically black dog, which she is - black nose leather). I am not sure seal is a form of sable. Sable dogs can look dark, light, and in between. The sabling does not affect all hairs (e.g. the white spotting will not be sabled) so it can be just at the mask and base of tail (like some Malinois). It can be nearly black. She has a seal look, but I'm betting some of those dark hairs have pale bases. You get that very evenly distributed sabling on some Malinois and working lines GSDs. I think it's beautiful --so is she.

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  17. Here is a sable Malinois with probably the same basic color genetics as Kate, except that Kate has white Irish spotting (s). It tends to darken a bit with age. You can see some similarities such as the dark streak on the back, and the color is very similar. It looks different in different photos partly because different amounts of pale undercoat show in different positions.

    No one really has a definition for "seal." You can call her "seal" if you want. :) It is more a breed-by-breed label for a color appearing in the breed, e.g. Bostons. Sable, as pointed out, is a pattern, and it has a specific definition. (I.e. the two terms are not equivalent.) Kate is probably a Bb or BB (black) dog with not a lot of other color modifiers than the sabling (an allele of the a, agouti, gene).

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  18. I suck. HERE is the sable Malinois:
    http://www.greatdogsite.com/photos/gallery/Belgian_Malinois/?index=1

    Not too surprisingly, my Captcha word is "dulard."

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  19. I agree that sable is technically correct, but the first description that popped into mind for her coloring was chocolate and white.

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  20. Hypercolor? Does anyone else remember those shirts that changed colors all the time??

    But in any light, she is lovely to look at!

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  21. For border collies, "chocolate" means a rich red-brown. It is genetically red (bb) and would come with a liver nose, not a black nose. For border collie people, chocolate would not come to mind here. Katie's base color is black, not brown (black nose): Bb or BB. The first thing that pops into my mind is seal and white, even though seal is not well defined. I'll shut up now.

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  22. She looks neither rodent nor aquatic to me, but just like a box of chocolates. A little milk chocolate, a little dark chocolate, some white chocolate, some delicious creamy filling... yummmmmmm. And of course, in a lovely package with a bow on top. Very pretty!

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