posted 06-13-2003 12:59 AM         

APBT is just the short term for American Pit Bull Terrier, one of the pure breeds grouped under the generic term "pit bull". They can technically come in any color or pattern, but it's obvious when a color just "shows up" after 100's of years that the breed has been in existance that something happened to compromise the purity of the line in which that trait showed up. There are various "types" of APBT, from the "pretty" show APBTs, to the stocky, wide, big headed dogs that are popular among BYBs and novices, to rangy, athletic, drivey dogs who many wouldn't even recognize as "pit bulls", and everything in between. Most working people prefer the rangier, more athletic dogs (depending on what they're being used for, they may prefer smaller, larger, or mid-sized dogs), whereas others may go fo the more impressive LOOKING dog, when in fact it may not be half as althletic/strong as the less impressive looking specimens. APBTs can have all types of ear sets, from "flat, lab ears", to prick ears (like a GSD), and anything in between. And yes, "Dank" on that site has natural ears.

On the subject of the merle pattern... I've read that "merle" in dogs is caused by the same gene that causes "dapple" in horses, thoughI don't know how much truth there is to it. After reading about "phantom merles" on the first link, I'm pretty sure that that's what Annie is. You can't see a spot of "merling" on her, yet her papers said she was a red merle (though my aunt got her from the local petstore, which wasn't exactly known for keeping good records, so I guess they could be wrong).

The other links were very good too, though there was one thing wrong in the last one. The piebald gene doesn't make color over white, it makes "white" (non-pigmented) over color, so to speak. From what I understand, the piebald gene keeps pigment from developing in the white areas, so the dog isn't genetically "white" even if its coat is entirely white in color. So, like with Haley... she looks white with fawn markings, but genetically, she's fawn with lots of white spotting (that's really oversimplified, there are a lot of other factors at work, but you get the idea). So a dog can be completely white in color, but not "technically" white, if the spotting (piebaldness, I guess) covers their entire body, then their actual color wouldn't be visible. This is not true for dogs that don't have the piebald gene though, like westies, white GSDs, etc. They have pigment in their skin still (if you look at one, their skin will be dark in color, not pink like in a piebald white dog). I don't know what causes the white color in them though. I'm sure that just confused you even more

Here's a few more links on merle, piebald, etc.

Merle and double merles (I like their description of how the pattern works): http://www.dachshund.org/article_double_dapple.html

Piebald. Check out "Is my dog albino?(or why are dogs white?)": http://deafdogs.org/faq/

I also like this one (also listed on the deafdogs site, but figured I'd put it here anyway): http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/Genetics/ColorGen.html
They also have a whole page about merles: http://bowlingsite.mcf.com/Genetics/Merle.html

And this one (also from the deafdogs site) lists a bunch of color genetics links, though they're not all about merles, etc): http://www.ansci.cornell.edu/cat/cg01/lk_color.html

One more, an APBT site, they also have some genetic stuff on there you may find interesting, and it's one of the best APBT sites out there right now: http://apbtconformation.com

posted 06-21-2003 10:44 AM            

Thank you for your interest in being a moderator. Your account has been modified
and you are now officially a moderator on the “Dogs – all types” and the “Pitbull” forums. Welcome on board !

As to your suggestion re adding a “large dogs” board. We feel it is already covered in the ”all types” forum. We want to keep it simple (not too many boards), therefore I think we should leave it at that for the time being. We will however look into it again in a couple of months.

Thanks again and have a great weekend.