Blue in Australia

[tasha]

don't you just love a mystery

[Sylvia]

tasha said:

don't you just love a mystery

Well you always have something to search for. ;D

[Sylvia]

daniela said:

Well he looks like a young dog, he reminds of a picture I have seen of a bitch called Skyrose Typhoon who was around in the '50s.

Yes he looks very young. But how old was that picture.. Maybe that is a picture from 1930??
Who knows.....

[tasha]

I hope this works its a head shot of Von Gaiberg's Blue Zephyr from 1969



This one is from the same magasine around the same time period and again is a cover so you can see the differences without too much change in the printing or photographic processes.

[daniela]

Sylvia, is the image not bylined in Stammbuch?

[daniela]

tasha said:

I hope this works its a head shot of Von Gaiberg's Blue Zephyr from 1969

Tasha I get an image of a cartoon girl in bra and pants. LOL. Didn't know you were into that kind of thing. LOL ;D

[Sylvia]

daniela said:

Sylvia, is the image not bylined in Stammbuch?

No, unfortunatly not.

[Alkemist]

and you know - the dog in this old picture - looks awfully like some dogs around today that are criticised for being too american hehe ;D It's certainly very elegant with a decent forechest.

Nina

[tasha]

can you see it now???

[daniela]

tasha said:

can you see it now???

No

[daniela]

Oh yes I can Tasha......it's showing now.

[lizgundog]

Leslie,
May be the early American standard was written to include the colours that had arrived there. You would need to find out who compiled the first American standard to get a correct answer. I have asked Deb Ryan (who is genetic scientist) to write an article explaining the genes that affect the Weimaraner - those that are dominant and those that are recessive. I think many of us do not fully understand which are the dominants. The most important issue at present is which path we choose to follow - do we become separate breeds i.e working dogs looking different to show dogs, I know that I certainly don't want that.
Liz

[tasha]

I hope we don't seperate the breed that would be devastating, the cocker spaniel is a prime example of a breed that has split, the show dog does not resemble the working dog in any way shape or form, conformation is different, temperment, even some of the diseases that they now suffer from

We owe our dogs and breed alot more than that. In the Uk our biggest problem isn't going to be the colour of the dogs - that will be resolved in due course, but I am not sure we will survive the anti docking laws, if those that are docked because they work cannot also be shown, I think we run the risk of the breed splitting between show and working

[anne]

lizgundog said:

May be the early American standard was written to include the colours that had arrived there.

The 1944 standard names blue as a color, Casar came to the US in 1950, so no, the standard was not written to include the colors of dogs that had arrived here. Jack Denton Scott, very much against the blues, says that it was poor translation. (There's that semanics issue again!)

lizgundog said:

The most important issue at present is which path we choose to follow - do we become separate breeds i.e working dogs looking different to show dogs, I know that I certainly don't want that.

I agree.

On the "pro and con" argument on my blueweims site, I quoted some comments, but included this in its entirety because I agreed with it so much:

From Warren Fulks, Director, Weimaraner Club of America, Dallas, Texas, The Weimaraner Magazine, March 1970

"Having read published statements by fellow directors of the Weimaraner Club of America, I now feel compelled to state my reaction to an emotionally charged issue of disqualification of the blue Weimaraner. My qualifications are not those of a breeder or historian. I write only as an observer who lives in an area of the country labeled by some as a "Blue Belt," suggesting that we have hundreds of blue Weimaraners in Texas. We don't. I am an owner of two silver-grays. It's a matter of color preference, not of quality.

"The blue Weimaraner is a fact of life. It is a pure-bred Weimaraner; it is not something else and most certainly it is not a mongrel. Some contend that breeders of blues are out to make a buck on a dog they describe as "rare." Equally relevant, I have heard silver-gray sellers describe the breed to a prospective buyer as something so versatile and excellent that hardly any other can approach it. Aren't they, too, out to make a buck? And the preponderance of breeders buy and sell silver-grays.

"As an observer at the show ring and at the trials, I see the same faults and the same qualities regardless of color. I see the same temperament, the same beauty, and in each one, those personality quirks which make each dog an individual within the breed.

"Memory recalls a pheasant hunt two years ago outside Oberlin, Kansas. Walking the draws behind the finest hunting Weimaraner I had ever seen, admiration for both the dog and its owner forced me to recall mediocre performances under similar conditions by so many others of the breed -- noteworthy individuals notwithstanding. This hunter was a rough-coated blue, a thorny burr perched indifferently on his hunter's nose. I remember another blue; his topline was perfect, his coat sleek as a circus horse, and he gaited like a spirited colt in the show ring. I never knew his won-loss record, but he looked magnificent, winning or losing.

"Now the entire WCA membership is called upon to judge whether the blue Weimaraner (which I confess I regard as no different from my own pets) is to be disqualified from the show ring. The outcome will no doubt affect its participation in the field.

"So don't tell me about striped dogs, or long-coated dogs. Don't tell me about the supposed hazards of someone's crossing a Weimaraner with an Irish Setter. And don't tell me about breeding for color alone-to make a buck. Tell me what is truly wrong with the blue Weimaraner.

"And while we're at it, consider breeding generally. Why is it that the Weimaraner, with all its admitted versatility, need so much upgrading both for ring and field? This is the real breeding problem. What has this to do with color? "

[lizgundog]

Very interesting Anne,
I can't understand how they could have come up with blue as a colour description any way, really to me it's a steel grey colour and possibly in the darker range of the grey colour scheme.
I know that in Australia at present there is a huge push in Border Collies to allow any colour to be acceptable, the only thing that the traditional breeders are saying is that 'everyone knows that a border collie is black and white'. So now what we have to be careful of is that we don't end up with Vizla coloured or GSP coloured Weimaraners because they just wouldn't look like Weimaraners would they. I can see some people point of view in regard to the 'Blue' however I think that it is not popular here at all.
Liz.

[anne]

Liz,

From blueweimaraner.com/tell.html

"Jack Denton Scott, in his book, The Weimaraner, offers a copy of the 1944 Weimaraner standard in which the Blue color is an accepted color. (“Color Gray (Silver, Bright, Dark, Yellow) the Dark Gray may be either ash or blue…”), but maintains that this standard was “clouded by inept translation from the original German and riddled with loopholes by the lack of foresight of the persons responsible for its acceptance” (109)."

"Alexander and Isabell inform us in Weimaraner Ways that“… Germans also used the term [blues] synonymously with mouse-gray” (52). "

"Further, Captain Holt maintains throughout his interview with the WCA that mouse-gray is the same color as blue. Holt also asserts that there were other dogs of the same color as Cäsar and the color was not considered aberrant by the Germans because they were considered mouse-gray and within the standard. "

(I do have a copy of the WCA meeting minutes on the website.)\

Petri says:

"What distinguishes the Weimaraner immediately from other comparable breeds is his gray colour. It is often difficult to decide whether a dog is silver-gray, deer-gray or mousy-gray and this depends on the lighting, background, etc. Here, quite often the wish is the father of colour determination. As it is just about impossible to define clearly the above mentioned colours, it might be better to leave them out entirely in the future. However, in any case the colour of the dog must be without any doubt gray!"

Could it be then.... that the lighter blues "passed" in Germany and the darker blues were culled?

As for V colored Weims. I have seen it in photos. The dog was type-y, definitely Weim, just the color was rust. I have also seen GSP spots on Weims, that the breeder insisted was full Weim, although I have my doubts. I have seen pictures of or heard of all sorts of variations in color. I don't know if we should open this can of worms and I never researched it completely but I can tell you that when I started research color for my blue research, there were interesting stories that came out. One that I can document is that there were purported black Weims from gray parents. Rusty Jenrette wrote an article in Dog World about it. Note, that the parents are always gray not blue. The article is reprinted with permission in the BluMar magazines which I have permission to duplicate on my site.

[Leslie]

lizgundog said:

So now what we have to be careful of is that we don't end up with Vizla coloured or GSP coloured Weimaraners because they just wouldn't look like Weimaraners would they.

That's a difference of opinion. I think there is a difference between the Blue color and being Visla- or GSP, etc. colored. Both the Blue and the "Gray" are solid color dilutions and both have a silvery sheen. To me, a Blue Weim is still the spirit of a Weimaraner. Both are Gray. A different hue of gray - but still gray. Not copper, not spotted, not brindle. I think the Blues and Grays look stunning together.

Any other color Weim would be a new color introduction. Blues have been an established variation for nearly 60 years. (depending on which theory you subscribe to, could be much longer.)

I hope I don't offend those who have Longhairs - which I find very striking and beautiful - but for me, the sleek coat is very much what I love about a Weim and the Longhair doesn't have that look for me. I'm certainly not saying they aren't Weim's, I'm just saying it's a variation preference. Is there really any difference in accepting one variation and not the other? One is a difference in coat type, another in the hue of gray. Particularly since the Blue is such an easily controlled variation?

Blues ARE a variation of the Weimaraner. Sadly, the only thing disqualifying this variation does is make it really hard to breed them ethically. The Weim community is so wonderful about caring about rescues, but they have a blind spot to seeing what the disqualification has done to the Blue.