Cleaning the Mud of Myth from the Truth about White GSDs/White Shepherds
INTRODUCTION-THE GERMAN SHEPHERD DOG WHITE RECESSIVE GENE UNMASKED
This site is devoted to the serious study of the color genetics of the White Shepherd (also known as the White German Shepherd Dog). The White Shepherd is now recognized as a separate breed from the German Shepherd Dog with UKC, as well as with the Swiss registry. This seems to be the only way that this variation of the German Shepherd Dog can ever be allowed to express its full merit and cut through the myths and hostile attitudes toward the dogs of this particular color. Contrary to much that has been written before, there is no known medical, structural, or temperament problems genetically associated with the recessive gene that is responsible for the most commonly seen type of White Shepherd dog.
It is possible that there are genetically more than one type of White Shepherd, although White Shepherds due to any gene but the known White Recessive gene have not been verified as of yet. The White Recessive gene must be carried by both parents of a dog for the progeny to be white. German Shepherd Dogs of any color or pattern can carry this White Recessive gene. Until two colored dogs that both carry the recessive are put together and a white progeny results, there is no consistent way of knowing which dogs do or do not carry the gene. The gene has been in the breed since its creation, as were the genes for long hair, solid black dogs, the brown or liver dilution, and other variations.
The White Recessive gene is completely separate from the genes that cause white spotting in colored dogs. The most common form of white spotting is dominant and is found in many species. This form is responsible for white chest blazes, toes, and tail tips. White spotting superimposes itself on any color of German Shepherd Dog, although obviously it is going to be most conspicuous on a solid black dog and hardest to see against the background of a white dog's coat.
A rarer form of white spotting is seen occasionally in the German Shepherd dog, the Irish White Spotting gene. It is a recessive and thus dogs that produce it may not show the markings in their own coats. The Irish white spotting gene is responsible for such mysteries as pups with white muzzle blazes and "Border Collie" type markings. Because fanciers of the German Shepherd Dog breed as a rule do not like white spotting, and because the Irish white spotting gene is not one that shows up very frequently in the breed, dogs showing this type of white spotting are infrequently seen and rarely used for breeding. Dogs that tend to produce such "Irish" white marked animals also are often eliminated from breeding, or if they are exceptionally good animals otherwise, carefully managed in selective breeding and choosing of progeny, to lessen the likelihood of such markings occurring again. Of course, this is not too difficult when the gene for Irish spotting is a rare one in the breed anyway.
To put all this into perspective, look at the recessive gene for longcoat in the German Shepherd Dog breed. A tremendous number of GSDs carry coat, about 80%, including the overwhelming majority of important producing dogs of the breed. Because the gene is recessive (and can thus hide for generations) and also it is very common, there is no way that the longcoat gene will ever be eliminated from the breed, unless technology advances to the point of controlling genes in dogs (and is man wise enough to take this job from God and Mother Nature...I think not!)
In extensive reading and research, it seems that people tend to study what other authors have written and then they pass on the information they have acquired, sometimes word for word. Rarely has an author actually worked on studying actual dogs, litters, pedigrees, and data openmindedly to try to understand genes and how they work. The White Recessive gene is a good example of one that has been offhandedly dismissed or just lightly touched on in GSD color genetic research, partly because the political attitude against the color has been negative for many years. This attitude did not start with the inception of the breed as some believe, it came about during the times of racial discrimination and beliefs that certain races, religions, etc., of humans were superior to others. These attitudes and beliefs were imposed on the animals by the people in political power at those time periods in history.
There was little knowledge of genetics until the past few decades. While Mendel's discovery of dominant and recessive genetic relationships was a major advance long ago, the Mendelian Law is too simple to explain the actual workings of many genetic actualities in live animals. There are dominants and recessives, yes, but there are also many variations. For instance, while the long vs short coat is a simple recessive-dominant relationship, there are variations within this framework. A longcoated dog may have only a bit of fringe on its ears and longcoated dogs are found that span the gamut between the fringed ears all the way to a collie type of coat that may hang close to the ground. I know of one GSD with a long silky continuously growing coat, but have heard of no others, so this one may be a spontaneous mutation or be caused by some other extremely rare gene or combination of genes. This particular dog was out of well known lines and if the gene was not very uncommon, more dogs with this type of coat should exist.
The German Shepherd Dog actually seems to be a dog of red through tan to cream through silver in base color. Within these four main shades there are many subtle variations and degrees of intensity. Evidence, though, has shown that dogs that are intensely (meaning very clearly) pigmented, whether this color be an intense red, tan, cream, or silver, can produce intensity in other shades as well. Intense silvers, bred to so-so tans, can produce intense REDS! Dogs of intense colors tend to produce intense colors, although this is not consistently true. I have seen dogs that were of a dull tan produce both clear reds and clear silvers, where the other parent was either clear in coloration or known to produce clear colors. More evidence is needed to see if two dully colored tans can produce clear tans, reds, creams, or silvers. A dull colored tan means that the dog looks like tan, but also has enough grayish or cream shade in the tan pigment to make a person wonder if the dog is truly a tan or a cream. There are also many dogs that are inbetween red and tan in shade, where it is tough to tell if the dog is a tan or a red, but because the brightness of the red through tan side of the spectrum is popular right now, few people even notice that shades inbetween red and tan abound. The tendency is just to call such a red-tan dog a red or a tan, whichever the person's preference happens to be.
Imposed upon the dog's base color is the marking color, which is usually black. The marking color may appear in the agouti (commonly called sable pattern in America or gray pattern in Germany), the two-tone pattern (saddle through bicolor pattern where black is fairly solidly presented in specific areas of the dog's coat) or the black marking color may cover the entire animal, producing a solid black. Quite often dogs that are genetically solid black still have shadings of the base coloration peeking through the coat in the lower legs, as if the black marking color could not quite cover the ground color entirely. THE WHITE RECESSIVE GENE ALSO ACTS THIS WAY ON THE DOG'S BASE COLOR.
With the presence of a pair of white recessive genes necessary to mask the dog's genetic color and marking pattern, the white covers up the dog's base coat color of red, tan, cream, or silver, along with whatever marking color (agouti, twotone, or solid) the dog possesses. However, the white recessive acts like a thin sheet that is somewhat see-through. Put a thin white sheet against a darker color and the color underneath is much more visible than if that same sheet were put over a light color. White dogs that are genetically reds to tans are much more likely to show the creamy offwhite to reddish shades in their coats than white dogs that are genetically creams or silvers for that reason. In selecting for whiter whites, a breeder inadvertently selects for dogs that are genetically creams or silvers, because creams and silvers do not show through the white and cause the discoloration of the white that the reds and tans do.
Until the 1960s, silvers, creams, and tans were the most common colors in the breed and reds were rather uncommon. Selection for the reds and bright tans and against the creams and silvers, especially in Germany, has led to the abundance of dogs of these colors in the present day (and cosmetic enhancement also helps as well!) However, the genes for silver and cream still are present in the GSD worldwide, in all nations.
The gene for the recessive white is deeply entrenched in the German Shepherd Dog breed and has always been. Like the longcoat gene, it is common enough that attempts to eliminate it in German and other breeding programs that strongly seek to eliminate it have been unsuccessful. Culling has not eliminated this common recessive gene from the breed.
Because the German Shepherd Dog has grown to be such a large breed in numbers worldwide, several variations of the breed have been established. These variations are different enough that most people who have studied the breed can see them. The German show dog is a very different animal from the American show dog. The German working line dogs (and more and more, the dogs from Czech and East German working bloodlines can be added into this category as well) present another different variation of the breed. The White Shepherd is distinctive not only for its color, but also well bred whites possess distinctive structural characteristics as well from the other varieties. If these varieties were all colored alike, a knowledgeable person could still tell the difference between them.
Throughout history, other breeds of dogs have grown and separated into either variations within the breed or into separate breeds. It seems that the German Shepherd Dog may be going in this direction as well, and I believe it would be a direction for the better. The variations within the breed are more suitable for different purposes than other varieties. For instance, a tough German working dog is great for Schutzhund but may be impossible to deal with, and end up out of control in a family home with little dog experience. Show dogs are usually not the best working dogs, because show dogs have to be willing to gait around a ring and be willing to act animated and not show tiredness or boredom. The dog used for taking on armed and dangerous people must behave very differently than a dog who is sent on a search to find a lost child. These are just a few examples of why variation in a breed is not necessarily a bad thing, or does not mean that one variation is any better or worse than another. It just means that different variations within the breed differ in their ability to fit the purpose of the human that is in charge of the dog.
The most versatile individuals of the breed are going to be dogs of balanced physical and mental characteristics, and although this is what Max v Stephanitz had in mind when the breed was created, such balanced animals are not going to be the most flashy ones. The flashy animals that please the eye of fanciers today in their respective interests, include the brightly patterned German show dogs and their gaiting for hours to show endurance and perseverence, the hard hitting Schutzhund dogs that radiate barely-controlled energy and enthusiasm as they powerhouse their way through their exercises, and the racy fleet smooth moving American show dogs with their dramatic angulation and stance. The more extreme animals are flashier and more exciting than the moderate, balanced dog of correct structure, angulation, and temperament.
In the days before the breed went into its various more extreme directions, dogs that excelled in show, working, and truly were versatile and capable of doing a number of things well were much more commonly seen. It is now rare for a dog to excel in both conformation and high-scoring sport, and pretty much unheard of for a dog to do well in American conformation, German conformation, and high-scoring Schutzhund. Yet there was a time when individuals of the breed that could do well in all these aspects were NOT uncommon. While there are always imperfections to keep man humble, dogs of that period in time were overall more correct to Von Stephanitz's goal in establishment of the breed than the modern diverse branches of the breed today.
Maybe it is time for one breed to become a breed with variations, or to divide into a group of separate breeds. Variations within the breed make the most sense, because like the situation with the Persian and Himalayan cat in CFA, superior specimens of one type can occasionally come out of a litter of another type or one type bred to another can produce a specimen better than both parents, and with color recessives, the recessive gene that creates the variation such as the White German Shepherd Dog, still exists as commonly in the other varieties as well. If a superior white dog is born of parents of the German show variation, or other variation of the breed, then it could be a valuable asset in breeding in its own variety. If the breed splits into a group of separate breeds, then there should be provisions set down for the registration and breeding of dogs born in one "breed" within the former breed, that may be a great contributor to a different "breed" within the former breed.
One thing is certain, people are not going to give up their own preferences no matter how much fire is thrown across the internet or in print or speech. People who are passionately involved in their respective variety are not going to want to dump their own preference. They are going to resist the pressure of others who are fervently working to force the superiority their own variety onto the world of the GSD to the exclusion of all other varieties of the breed. In this day of easy world communication via the internet, people who are involved in other less common varieties within the breed, specifically people who are working with the livers, the blues, and the long-coated dogs, also have the capability of uniting and communicating with each other, thus becoming more visible to the GSD world. As long as there is no evidence of these cosmetic differences being connected with any medical, structural, or temperamental deficiency, then there is no reason to criticize these people for following their own path. After all, if everyone in the world liked the same dog, there would not be over 400 breeds of dogs worldwide, with many accepted variations and divisions within these breeds. Some breeds are very different in appearance, others are very similar. Most breeds evolve like branches from a tree, by growing in numbers and diversifying.
This site is being constructed to explore the facts of the White Recessive gene in the German Shepherd Dog/White Shepherd, to explain the workings of the gene in language that is hopefully not too difficult to understand, and to show examples of white dogs throughout history and their pedigrees, to show clearly the sources these dogs came from, the same sources that all other GSDs came from!
This site has also been created in an attempt to seek pedigree and photo data of white GSDs and Shepherds, document white dogs from colored parents, to show colored progeny of white x colored parentage, to examine the white recessive gene and its influence on the breed in depth so it can be more fairly evaluated and understood. Just writing what has been written before and passing it along to the next generation only serves to perpetuate myths and erroneous information from long ago. The more actual data that can be examined, the more consistently knowledge can be proven as fact.
Contributions of pedigrees, photos, and pertinent data may be snail mailed to:
DrWGSD Color Genetics Research
6165 S 550 E
Walton IN 46994
Any financial contribution anyone desires to make to further color genetic research in the GSD/White Shepherd Breed(s) is most appreciated. It takes a tremendous amount of time, effort, acquisition of materials (books, magazines, studbooks, and other data) and study of those materials to achieve accurate and substantial data.
