COBBERDOG COLORS

There are variations in Cobberdog coat colors known under the same name just as there are for humans.  For instance not everyone with "brown" hair will have the same shade of brown.  An infant's hair color can change its shade as an adult.  Puppies can too.  Dalmations are born with no spots.  Golden Sable Collies (Lassie dogs) are born grey with white.  German Shepherd dogs are not born with their glorious black saddle markings on shades of rusty brown but are born mostly black. 
​Cobberdog puppies also can vary from puppy to adult.

​Coat colour is not connected to coat type nor gender nor size. In these descriptions, "pigment" refers to nose, lip rims, eye rims  and paw pads.  

Black

Brown - Chocolate

Chocolate

Raven

Brown - Cafe or Cafe au Lait

Chocolate weathered

RAVEN AND BLACK

Both are black coated, with black pigment and eyes of either a rich brown to black.
Blacks tend to have chocolate highlights especially around the muzzle and seen in sunlight.  Ravens are  jet black with no brown.

BROWN -CHOCOLATE OR CAFE

Chocolates are darker brown than Cafes but are often thought to be Cafe due to the lighter highlights on the tips caused by sun rain and wind (weathering). If you're breeding, it's important to know the difference because genetically they breed differently. Both have brown or liver pigment and clear hazel to green eyes.

EXAMPLE: At first glance the dog on the left might be taken as a Cafe due to its outer weathered light tips.  But on parting ​it's coat you will see the dark chocolate close to the skin.
Cafe puppies are born the color of milk chocolate whereas Chocolates are born the color of a block of dark chocolate.

Sun / water kissing  or weathering of the long tips of the coat, can happen in any color to make it look different than it is genetically.  Weathering makes a dog appear to be a lighter color than it really is.
It is critically important that show judges do NOT penalize weathered coats.  If they do, the Australian Cobberdog will join the ranks of other long coated show dogs by being kept indoors, with their gorgeous locks wrapped in plastic or Chux wipes & rubber bands to preserve their "show coat" and denied  the enjoyment of a normal doggie life.  This would in my view be a tragedy.  Coats must be judged only on their cleanliness,  grooming, fleecy texture and non shedding status.  

Cool caramel close up nose and eye rims

CARAMEL

Caramels are interesting because there are so many shades from a pale golden cream through to a dark rich color of auburn similar to red.  The traits which differentiate them from Apricots, Golds or Reds are their brown/rose/liver pigment and clear transparent eye color.  
Brown noses are not a lack of pigment in this breed and they are not susceptible to sun-burning.  I have always called the paler caramels "cool" and the richer darker shades "warm" to set them apart.

Still puppies. Will they lighten or darken?

Warm Caramel full body

color deepening from the skin outwards

Apricot

Apricot

Red with black pigment

Red

CREAM

Cream can be any shade from a chalky white to a pale golden color.(often called Gold)
Their pigment must be jet black on nose, around eye rims lip rims and paw pad undersides.  Eye color is rich dark brown, the
darker the better, right through to sparkling black.
The reason for strong pigment color is that if black pigment gets pale it's either the sign of a diet deficient in minerals (weakened immune system) or a lack of pigment which predisposes to sunburn, unlike the liver/rose pigment in Caramels and other dilutes, which are strong in their own right.
Some Creams have peach colored ears and a matching shade along the center of their backs. 

APRICOT

Apricot as the name implies, is ideally the color of inside a ripe apricot. 
Pigment must be black. and eyes rich dark brown. 

The color of an Apricot  coat can be the same as a warm Caramel which is why it's important for breeders to note pigment color, because the two are genetically different and will produce different color results when bred.                     

It's easy to confuse Apricots with Reds at birth and during the first few weeks of life, since some deepen in color with age, and others go paler.

RED

Reds are definitely striking, with some so vivid when they're young that they look artificially dyed. 

But very few maintain their depth of color throughout their lives, with most fading to a pale-ish Apricot by about 3 years of age or sooner.  Pigment may be either red or black and eyes should always be a rich dark brown.

It's been my anecdotal observation that in order to produce better Reds, it was important to choose different breeding mates for black pigmented red dogs than for the others.

These days color genetics are better understood and DNA color testing can be a boon to breeders. who are into breeding particular colors.

As for me personally, I prefer to not be too fixated on color. borrowing   from an old equine axiom that states " A good horse is never a bad color".

​

PARTI COLOR

Parti Color caramel and white

Parti Colors ( or "Partis") are white or cream, patched with any acceptable colour. 
Pigment and eye color are what is appropriate for the solid colored patching.   

Chocolate and White Particolor

Raven and White Parti

Puppy with his silver starting to show

2 young adult Silvers

​Parchment

Parchment most often commences  from chocolate as puppies and then progressively changes color year by year.  Most retain brown head, ears, faces and legs up to about 4 or 5 yrs which contrasts to the milky myriad of colors elsewhere.  They are well known for appearing to be different shades depending on the light, in much the same way as the tinted tones we see at times after rain, when the sunshine returns.  At times they can look a beautiful mauvish pink when mature adults. 

Much the same as white horses which are born black or chestnut and change with the years to dapples which finally disappear, when you have a Parchment Cobberdog you have a different pet to watch changing colors throughout their lives.  Which chocolate puppies will develop into parchment, can be determined at about 8 weeks of age by parting the coat on top of the head to reveal a paler color at the roots.  There will also often be a sprinkling of silvery cream on the upper side of their tail a third of the way down its length.  This sprinkling becomes more visible as they mature.  Parchments are dilutes and as such, they have liver/brown pigment and hazel translucent eyes.

LAVENDER

Very rare, possibly because they are often born Chocolate and go through stages similar to Parchment, so are missed by breeders when selecting the puppies they will keep for breeding.  
There have been times when I have come across some of the most exquisite dogs I've bred, who have been de-sexed as pets, and I've had no idea they were Lavenders in time to keep them!

Lavenders have what can be best described as mauve pigment and the clear translucent eyes of the caramels. and other dilutes.

SILVER

Silver lost favor due to people saying it made their young dogs look old and very few breeders encourage it in their bloodlines now.  Puppies are born black. and the undersides of their paw pads show silver shortly after birth.  Silver begins as 'goggles' around their eyes and starting with their feet, it spreads up the legs and eventually their body.

About 12 months old

There are other colors in the Australian Cobberdog breed, such as Phantom, (carriers of Parti, but not Parti themselves), Blue -  (rare) which looks like black other than for their blue skin, and the Merles.  

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