Frequently Asked Questions

In humans, we know that our children may not have the same eye colour as their parents, the same is true for dogs. While a dog may carry a gene within them to express a particular characteristic (just like a child with brown eyes may have a parent with blue eyes), they may not always express it.

This is the wonder of genetics, and it allows each and every one of us to be different depending on what genes we carry, and which of those genes are switched on. Not all labradoodles look the same, yet they are all the same breed? Why is that, it all depends on their genotype and phenotype!

Phenotype and genotype - what does it mean?

Your dogs phenotype is what you see when you look at your dog. For example your dogs coat colour, ear shape and size.

Your dogs genotype is what genes make up a character within your dog. There are two important types of genes that can make up a genotype and so determine what phenotype you might see in your dog.

There are recessive genes and dominant genes.

A recessive gene is one that is only expressed as a phenotype if there are two of them, while a dominant gene will be expressed as a phenotype when there is only one of them.

For example:

Let's say that 'l' is the gene for a long coat in dogs. Long hair is a recessive gene, which means that a dog must have two copies of l it's genotype for it to have the phenotype of a long coat (one gene from each parent).

Your dogs genotype: l/l Your dogs phenotype: long coat

Now let's say the gene for a short coat is dominant, 'S' . Say your neighbour has a dog, whose parents were one long haired dog, and one short haired dog. Because S is a dominant gene, in your neighbours dogs genotype they only need one S for their dog to show a short coat phenotype.

Your neighbours dogs genotype: s/l Your neighbours dogs phenotype: short coat

So why doesn't my dog look like the breeds in my BITSA report?

It's important to remember that a mixed dog doesn't always show the characteristics (phenotypes) of the breeds that are in the dog. Sometimes that may look almost exactly like their reported breeds, other times not at all. This is because the dog may have inherited many recessive genes of the breed, or depending on the gene there could be other genes from additional breeds in your dog that 'override' the characteristic that you might be expecting to see.

It's also important to remember that not everything about a breed is in it's appearance. How does your dog behave? Your dog might show behaviours that might be attributable to the breeds in its report and have a strong behavioural genotype rather than a physical one of its reported breed.

Environment also plays a large role in the characteristics your dog may display, as environmental interactions with genes are very important. For example a dog that has had a negative experience early in life, may be quite shy - whereas a breed in its breed report may suggest that it is a very outgoing and confident dog. As you can see, there are a number of things that can influence a phenotype.

In addition to this, depending on what level a breed is reported at in your report, may influence how much your dog displays these breed characteristics. For example a Primary breed (more than 50% of your dogs genetic make up) is much more likely to be apparent in your dog than a distant breed (less than 12.5% of your dogs genetic make-up).

So if your dog looks an awful lot like a Chihuahua, but in their ancestry they have been identified as a Distant Great Dane - don't be alarmed! This only accounts for less than 12.5% of your dog's ancestry, and any number of breeds could be present in your dog that are having an influence on your dogs appearance, just keep in mind that your little dog may be a big dog on the inside!