Yes, the USA sees them as seperate breeds but yet the Laekenois doesn't have full AKC recognition. Because of them being lumped as varieties in Canada you ~can~ breed a mal with a terv. (not that I agree with that) Even is the US, it is not uncommon for breeders to mix malinois and laekenois. Because they are essentially the same breed it is not an unusual ocurrence for a same variety pair to throw offspring of another "type". For example 2 groenedaels could throw a couple of tervs in a litter. In FCI countries the dogs would be registered as they fall i.e. a longhaired brown would be registered as a tervuren even if it had two groenendael (black) parents. In the US, the longhaired brown out of two blacks would be registered as a groenendal with a disqualifying fault for colour! Coat colour and length genetics are pretty complicated. One of my dogs is a mutant. Tanja is sable with a reverse mask. She's the one on the left (in case you weren't sure :-) ) http://www.pbase.com/wendybeard/image/70809520 I only know of 2 others in the US and one in Canada with similar colouration. One of the dogs in the US was actually a product of two groenendaels (black longhair)
Wendy Now getting really OT: More than you could ever want to know about goat genetics :-) http://www.belgiansworld.com/belgians_faq_coatgenetics.htm On 3/19/07, Christian <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > William Robb wrote: > > > > > My understanding is that in the USA, the Belgians are actually recognized as > > four different breeds, whereas in Canada, they are 4 different varieties of > > the same breed. > > Logically, it makes sense to call them four breeds. Their physical > characteristics (especially color, coat length and size) are so > distinctive. Plus you "can't" interbreed a malanois with a Tervuren, > for example, and call the offspring purebreds. It would be like calling > German wirehair, shorthair and longhair pointers the same breed (to use > my favorite example). Maybe it is that "breed" and "variety" are used > interchangeably... After all they are ALL the same species. :-) > > -- > -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net
