Finding a silver lining

Is there such a thing as a fantastic dog that’s a bad colour? Some may think so but conformation is more important.

- David Tomlinson

THERE’S A SAYING IN the equine world that a good horse can’t be a bad colour. Sadly, that doesn’t apply to gundogs. To compete under Kennel Club rules, dogs have to conform loosely to the breed standard. There’s no check of a dog’s conformation at a trial — if there was few would be permitted to take part — but colour is another matter.

There would almost certainly be objections if you entered retriever trials with a silver Labrador or AV spaniel trials with a solid-coloured springer. I have yet to see my first silver Lab, but they have long been a subject of heated debate in the Labrador world, especially in the US where they first appeared almost a century ago.

If you can imagine a Labrador the colour of a Weimeraner you will have a good idea of what a silver one looks like. It is often claimed that these socalled silver Labs have Weimeranerblood in their ancestry, though this has never been proven.

There’s even a website called Say No to Silver Labradors “supported by Labrador retriever breeders, judges, pet owners and enthusiasts around the globe”. Our Kennel Club doesn’t recognise silver as a Labrador colour; the American one does, though it classifies them under chocolate.

Solid-coloured English springers occur rarely and, again, I’ve never seen one, but I have been sent photographs of handsome all-liver individuals, invariably born in a litter of liver-and-white puppies.

Throwbacks