a show in 1873 when there was only one class for Retrievers - this postdates the appearance of Tweedmouth/Ilchester yellow Wavycoated Retrievers.

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1 Dear Amanda I was recently looking up Flatcoat information on the internet and picked up on a link to the Yellow FCR section on your website. I must compliment you on the passion and research you have put into the subject. I have a great interest in the history of the Retriever breeds and compiled an article on the subject which was published (an abbreviated version) in Animal Talk back in Over the years, we have also acquired a small collection of old books on retrievers and retriever training written in the late 1800s - early 1900s so thought I would provide you with some more information and perhaps another side to the story presented on your website. Apologies for the long but there was a lot of information on your website. I agree with many of your comments but on the more delicate issue of colour prejudice in FCRs, I am sure that in the modern age very few would support the culling of healthy FCR pups on the basis of colour and I for one would strongly condemn such practice. I believe the large majority of people are on the same page in this regard. Our Victorian forefathers who created and moulded the retriever breeds were far more ruthless, which is why we now benefit from the wonderful retriever temperament, biddability and desire to please. Historical records demonstrate that the mainstream retrievers we know today (CCR, FCR, GR, LR & CBR ) come from a broadly common ancestry with a lot of mix and match based on function, form and to some extent as you rightly state fashion and not forgetting the inevitable politics. The dominance of black in early Curlies, Wavycoats, and Labs is the consequence of gene make-up and the fact that the best working dogs were invariably black so became dominant breeding stock. Sure, the odd brindle and varicoloured retriever along with liver and russet colours were around in the very early years but as retriever kennels evolved, so the black colour dominated. It should come as no surprise that when the first Wavy/Flatcoat breed notes were published by JH Walsh in 1878, the colour specified was rich black. This was not mentioned in the 7 th para of the webpage where reference is made directly to the 1923 standard. As you are aware, Sewallis Shirley was one of FCR s greatest supporters and as founder and as Chairman of the Kennel Club he was quite happy to accept Walsh s breed notes as the initial standard for the FCR. The yellow coat colour was a distinct rarity, indeed more of an anomaly (in the biological sense) for reasons best explained by geneticists. The large kennels owned by the Victorian landed gentry pursued gundog breeding with vigour in their effort to create the perfect retriever for their shooting parties and the railways helped spread interests more widely in a geographic sense. Accordingly, it is perhaps an oversight that your webpage makes only passing reference to one of the key events around the whole colour issue which of course is Lord Tweedmouth s Guisachan kennel stud book and records that provided the history to the foundation of the Golden Retriever breed back in the 1860s. The establishment of the Tweedmouth and Ilchester yellow retriever lines is a turning point of the colour debate. The first date reference and quote from Shaw s book of 1881 is already focusing on the breed show aspect - the fashionable colour for FCRs is black and no other colour stands a chance at modern shows. Such comments are to be expected since Walsh s Wavy/Flatcoated retriever breed points were published a couple years previously. While Shaw refers to breed shows, by far the greater majority of FCRs were on country estates doing a good job in the field and never saw the show ring - including liver dogs as was proven later in Dog shows started in 1860 s and were more of an urban pursuit - hence colour fashion relating to the shows only began to influence retriever breeding in the late 1800s. According to Rawden Lee, Wavycoated Retrievers were first exhibited at

2 a show in 1873 when there was only one class for Retrievers - this postdates the appearance of Tweedmouth/Ilchester yellow Wavycoated Retrievers. Dr Bond Moore is mentioned in the 6 th Para of the website discussion. It is no coincidence that he preferred the large heavy coated and heavy boned dogs of the old Wavycoat type that were prevalent at the time. The reference to Moore s yellow litter is interesting as it also ties in with comments by Rawden Lee in his book A History and Description of Modern Dogs of Great Britain & Ireland 1897, who describes Moore s dogs as of enormous size and coarse to boot and one or two of his dogs had ugly light eyes. Could this indicate the influence of e genes hence yellow puppies appearing and the light eye in otherwise black dogs? It is likely that Lord Chichester s Wavycoated dogs were also of this more heavy type and photos of their offspring, Marjoribanks famous yellow dog Nous, supports this. Another interesting point is that Shirley s famous FCR Zelstone appears in several of Marjoribank s Golden Retriever pedigrees. Why?... from pictures, Zelstone was also more of the heavy Wavycoated type and was reported to have sired a few yellow puppies. Dogs by Zelstone thought to carry the yellow gene e.g. Moonstone (another of Shirley s famous dogs) were used at Guisachan. As you know, some of the more influential retriever breeders began introducing Black Setter and Collie blood to produce birdiness + a flatter and shorter coat more suited to the British countryside and so establish a more racy dog with less lumber that was to evolve into the true FCR Type we still see today with the unique Flatcoat temperament. With the Tweedmouth/Ilchester yellow retrievers also gaining recognition, the FCR remained predominantly black and occasionally liver (the odd yellow may have appeared, carried over in recessive genes from Irish Setter crosses and the old type heavy wavycoat). Divergence between Goldens and FCRs progressed and breeders dedicated to the true FCR moved away from the heavy Wavycoat and with this the yellow recessive gene diminished. The Golden Retriever emerged as a broader, more strongly built dog of similar height to the FCR, taller than the Lab. Finding the yellow Ee gene combination to develop the yellow breed proved challenging and it took several decades of experimentation success and failure that involved inevitable in-breeding as well as crosses to different breeds that had the pigment gene e.g. water spaniels, Irish Setters even bloodhounds. You may have read the following extract from an Article in Country life Magazine Feb 1908 about Capt. Radclyffe s Hyde kennel : A matter of ten or twelve years ago, in certain of the litters sired by one particular dog, one or more of the puppies were born pure white in colour (cream). This dog was a purebred scion of the old breed, and there was no chance of there being any mongrel blood in his veins. The owner carefully preserved all white puppies, and in course of time hoped to perpetuate a breed of white dogs by breeding from his favourite white dog Gipsy. But out of the first forty-six puppies sired by this dog from black mothers not one of the pups was white. Another interesting remark comes from Hutchinson s Dog Encyclopaedia 1935: It is strange that although the chocolate-tinted Flatcoats are of fairly common occurrence, no other colour is to be met in the breeding of this retriever. This suggests that after recovering from the first World War, breeding had all but eliminated the pigment suppressant gene from bloodlines, so yellows no longer appeared or were extremely rare. So the mix and match that had to take place post second world war decimation of the breed would most certainly have re-introduced the yellow recessive and is a much more likely reason for its presence in a number of bloodlines today rather than a highly tenuous link back to the earliest bloodlines. Labradors were accepted as a separate breed by the KC in 1903 and for regulatory consistency, yes - Tweedmouth/Ilchester retrievers were initially registered as Flatcoat yellow or Golden along with

3 any yellow FCRs - if there were any! However by 1908, with the rapid growth in popularity following their first appearance at Crufts, the Golden Retriever gained its own breed status in a dog that 30 years earlier for all intents and purposes was a rare yellow Wavycoated Retriever. The colour distinction was thus established. Just to illustrate some of the challenges behind pedigrees and breed registration in that era, it is worth mentioning that at Crufts dog show in 1915, it was found out that the black Labrador awarded the CC was sired by a pure bred Flatcoat whose relatives were winning in the Flattie ring nearby! In the 8 th para, it is suggested that the liver colour did not experience the sad fate of the yellow primarily due to wealthy benefactors. This is supposition, but more probable was that liver dogs were better accepted where it mattered most, in the shooting field and not on the show bench. A liver-coloured FCR bitch named Rust was the winner of the first Retriever Society field trial in 1900 (run as a new branch of the International Gundog League). Four years later her son Don of Gerwn, also a liver coloured FCR, won the IGL Championship trial. Is this dog an Wavy-coat, FCR or a Golden - or perhaps all three? Much harder to find choc labs accepted in shooting or FT circles! Regarding breed popularity and the fall of the FCR from dominance at the beginning of the 20 th century nothing sinister here. Remembering that the Curly-coated Retriever was the first recognised specialist retriever in early 1800s the FCR/Wavycoat natural working ability, tractability and looks led to the Curlies demise. Although the first world war took serious toll, it was as soon as a Lab had won the IGL (1906) that its popularity went exponential - easier and quicker to train, clean tough coat, smaller, biddable and eager to please great nose and great in water. Having just been to the CLA Game fair in UK and attended sessions from Ian Openshaw (top Spaniel trainer in UK) and John Halstead Jnr (top Retriever trainer in UK) both agree that as a generalisation, you can train Lab for shooting that can also compete in UK field trials at 1 year, a Golden in 2 years and an FCR in 3 years. Perhaps you disagree but rest assured I will be the first to congratulate should a Zimzala FCR win an open stake. Only the dedicated few have the patience to train an FCR to that level of competence hence they are often described as an acquired taste ; particularly in the highly competitive FT environment in UK where FCRs tend to have a greater following amongst the show fraternity. In Scandinavia, the opposite appears to be the case - the Swedes like FCRs more than labs and the majority hunt with them!

4 The cancer predisposition in FCRs is a concern for everyone in the breed but the statistics require better understanding and scrutiny rather than emotional reaction. Given that Goldens also have high cancer prevalence and with the common history of the breed, any genetic predisposition will invariably still be there as it will be in the odd yellow FCRs that are born. The following article may be of interest: Why are Golden retrievers more likely to die of cancer than any other breed? Golden retrievers routinely lived until 16 and 17 years old in the 1970s, now they live until 9 or 10 3,000 goldens have been signed up for $25million Colorado study Golden retrievers die of bone cancer, lymphoma and a cancer of the blood vessels more than any other breed in the country Read more: To suggest that the yellow gene would lower predisposition to cancer in FCRs has no scientific logic and certainly does not justify breeding to yellow FCRs. I sincerely hope and indeed believe that the situation is not as dire as suggested on the web page. Di and I lost the top FCR seen in this country for decades when our Odin died at 4 years of age to liver cancer so we certainly have an interest and are not burying our head in the sand! We also had a top winning Lab diagnosed with a life threatening cancer at 4 years of age but he lived on to nine after a change to natural diet. There are moves to identify and breed away from lines with high incidence of cancer or early mortality. The statistical support to Jane Dobson s paper on Breed Pre-disposition to Cancer in Pedigree Dogs (2013) appears rather skewed in terms of sample size, given the relative popularity of the respective Retriever breeds in UK. 610 FCRs to only 574 Labs and 974 GRs (being the largest single sample from a specific breed). She accepts that some breeds are overrepresented. Probably FCR owners were more willing to submit data to the survey because they have recognised an alarming trend as have the GR owners. Having just returned from Sweden and Norway which have the strongest support base for the FCR and currently produce the best quality FCRs in the world, breeders expressed concern but many had old dogs at home (12yrs+) and were of the opinion that early mortality due to cancer was on the wane. Let s hope this trend continues. I believe a much more relevant study would be to determine if there is a link between early mortality due to cancer and certain types of processed dog foods particularly those package foods of the 90 s and early 2000 era. I doubt many vets would be supportive. Regardless - FCRs are slowly gaining some recognition and status in South Africa which is good to see after a prolonged absence. Having opposing camps on the colour issue offers no benefits either way; rather work in the common interest of the fit for purpose Flatties, aim to minimize the risk of cancer susceptibility and any other hereditary diseases in our small gene pool. Also of importance is the fact that the FCR does not split show from working type and this will be critical for the FCRs on-going success. Dedicated breeders aim to improve type and quality of their stock. Nothing suggests that yellow FCRs are of top quality to justify breeding with if fact the opposite appears more often the case e.g. eye colour and pigmentation. They may be perfectly nice dogs but that is where they should remain. You may wish to review the breed info page of the Dare kennel (US) website that presents some balanced comments: Should a yellow FCR appear in a litter then by all means have it registered so it can perform in working disciplines but in the interest of both FCRs and Goldens, is it not best to follow the

5 guidelines supported by the majority of FCR clubs and associations around the world and include a not for breeding restriction on registration documents and pedigrees? You are fully entitled to your opinion however I believe it is more appropriate to present a balanced and objective review of the yellow FCR and cancer issue rather than an emotional one. Kind regards Mike Mike Holman