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A Dog's Colour Could Impact Longevity, Increase Health Problems:
Recessive colour genes could indicate health problems.
New research led by the University of Sydney has revealed the life expectancy of chocolate Labradors is significantly lower than their black and yellow counterparts.
The study of more than 33,000 United Kingdom-based Labrador retrievers of all colours shows chocolate Labradors also have a higher incidence of ear infections and skin disease. Its findings were published in the open access journal Canine Genetics and Epidemiology today.
[...] In the UK, the median longevity of non-chocolate Labradors is 12.1 years, more than 10 percent longer than those with chocolate coats. The prevalence of ear inflammation (otitis externa) was twice as high in chocolate Labradors, who were four times more likely to have suffered from pyo-traumatic dermatitis (also known as hot-spot).
[...] "The relationships between coat colour and disease may reflect an inadvertent consequence of breeding certain pigmentations," he said. "Because chocolate colour is recessive in dogs, the gene for this colour must be present in both parents for their puppies to be chocolate. Breeders targeting this colour may therefore be more likely to breed only Labradors carrying the chocolate coat gene. It may be that the resulting reduced gene pool includes a higher proportion of genes conducive to ear and skin conditions."
Journal Reference:
Paul D. McGreevy, Bethany J. Wilson, Caroline S. Mansfield, Dave C. Brodbelt, David B. Church, Navneet Dhand, Ricardo J. Soares Magalhães, and Dan G. O'Neill Labrador retrievers under primary veterinary care in the UK: demography, mortality and disorders. https://doi.org/10.1186/s40575-018-0064-x.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Reziac on Sunday October 28 2018, @03:54AM
Speaking as a canine professional with nearly 50 years in the field, and a specialty in Labradors, y'all don't know what you're talking about. The difference between black and yellow Labs is ONE gene. The difference between black and chocolate is also just ONE gene, controlling whether black is fully expressed. Blacks and yellows both have fully expressed pigment; chocolates do not (that's why they're brown and not black). /simplified for an amateur audience
Pigment affects a lot of things (hearing, vision, nervous system, immune system). And we've known for some time that the black gene in wolves, which came from crossbreeding with domestic dogs, is associated with a stronger immune system, hence is spreading among wild wolves. That the same applies to dogs is hardly surprising; very likely it applies across the entire species.
Of all domestic dog breeds, Labradors have the largest and broadest gene pool. And they can't be both purebreds and mutts, which are opposites.
When various species of wild animals were DNA profiled, average level of inbreeding was found to be about 25% which is quite a lot higher than the average for domestic animals. (D'ya really think a buck cares that half those does are his daughters?) There's a lot of noise about inbreeding vs domestic animals, but in the real world, with real data, the theories don't hold up very well. Actual breeding research, using live animals (and same with human pedigrees) has found that a certain level of linebreeding (3rd cousin or thereabouts) is more beneficial than is persistent outcrossing.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.