Barrows and Phillips: Color in Cocker Spaniels 



395 



SIMCOE PURITY, A WHITE COCKER SPANIEL 



A valuable "sport" in the breed is this dog, produced in the Simcoe kennels of F. E. Curtis, 

 Simcoe, Ontario, Canada. He is the offspring of a solid black dog and a solid red bitch. 

 The animal is not an albino, for his nose and foot-pads, as well as eyes, are dark in color. 

 He is probably to be considered a dilute lemon. The value of inbreeding is well illustrated 

 in a case like this: bred to outside females, Purity has produced no white pups, but when 

 mated with his own close relatives a few pups in each litter are white. As a result, a pure 

 white strain, hitherto unknown in the breed, might be established. (Fig. 6.) 



in the table probably arise from the 

 curious behavior of the spotting factor 

 in different strains of dogs. If two 

 individuals, which show small spots, 

 coming from a solid color strain, are 

 crossed, half of the resulting offspring 

 are apt to be solid color, while the rest 

 will be spotted. Selection for larger 

 areas of white or color has a cumulative 

 effect, which affects the ratio of spotted 

 to solid offspring. 



Another cause of apparent irregular- 

 ities in the table arises from the fact 

 that a dog showing a breast spot or 

 white on the toes may be classed as a 

 solid color in the kennel records. The 

 two litters of thirteen solid color pups, 

 shown in the last column of the table 

 are from a tricolor mated with a spotted 



dog. The bicolor pattern factor, which 

 will be described later, seems to have 

 some effect in producing pups of solid 

 color. 



The second type of spotting, which 

 we shall call bicolor spotting,^ is in 

 reality due to a pattern factor which 

 allows a lighter (hypostatic) color to 

 show on certain definite parts of the 

 body. For example the condition most 

 frequently seen is that of a black dog 

 having dark or light red or lemon spots 

 over each eye, and extended red areas 

 distributed on the sides of the muzzle, 

 inside of the ear, posterior surfaces of 

 the legs, and on the ventral sides of the 

 chest, abdomen, and tail. This pattern 

 is most striking when found on dogs 

 showing much black, but it is commonly 



See Pocock, R. I., 1907. On the Black-and-Tan Pattern of Domestic Dogs (Cants familiaris) . 

 Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., Ser. 7. Vol. 19, pp. 192-194. 



