Studying two poodle coat patterns no test explains today
Poodle Genetics Lab is running a controlled research pilot to collect the phenotype, pedigree, and family data needed to eventually investigate two coat-pattern questions that aren’t explained by any commercially available DNA test today. This is a research collection effort, not a diagnostic tool and not a genomic discovery program yet — nothing submitted here is used to make any claim about what causes either pattern.
Why this exists
Commercial coat-color DNA panels test for a fixed, known set of loci. Two patterns breeders and owners see in real poodles — Irish/tuxedo-type white spotting and head-white (“Whitehead”) patterning — aren’t explained by any of those results. A dog can test clear at every commercial locus and still show one of these patterns, or test as a carrier and show no pattern at all.
That gap is a data problem before it can become a genetics problem. No one has assembled the family structures — littermates with different outcomes, known parents, multi-generation pedigrees — that would even let a qualified statistical or canine geneticist start asking whether either pattern segregates in a way consistent with a single gene, several genes, or something more diffuse. This program exists to build that dataset carefully, with real participant protections, before any genetic-cause question is asked.
Current studies
R001 — Irish/Tuxedo White Spotting
Open for SubmissionsPoodles showing Irish/tuxedo-type white patterning that isn’t explained by standard commercial S-locus results.
Read about R001R002 — Whitehead Patterning
Open for SubmissionsPoodles showing head-white (“Whitehead”) patterning not explained by standard commercial coat-color panels.
Read about R002What we don’t know
Neither pattern has an identified causal gene, locus, or inheritance model, and no validated genetic test exists for either one. We do not know whether either pattern is caused by one gene, several genes, or a more diffuse combination of factors and environment. This program does not assume an answer — it exists to collect the family and phenotype data a future, qualified analysis would need to start asking the question. Anything you read on this site about either pattern is a description of what’s observed, not a claim about its cause.
How participants are protected
Every category of use — research use of your dog’s data, use of uploaded genetic files, sharing with approved academic collaborators, de-identified publication, future re-analysis, future contact, biological sample collection, research use of images, and public use of images — is a separate, explicit choice you make. Agreeing to one does not agree to the others, and you can change any of them later.
You can withdraw at any time. Submissions are open to the public — anyone with a poodle relevant to one of the studies is welcome to take part. We especially value well-documented families (littermates, known parents, multi-generation pedigrees), because that structure is what makes the data most useful.
What participation involves
- Sign in with a one-time email link — no password to remember.
- Review and choose your consent settings, category by category.
- Register your dog(s): basic identifying information, no diagnosis required.
- Submit a phenotype observation using our standardized scoring rubric — borderline or ambiguous patterns are a valid, expected answer, not something to force into a clean yes/no.
- Link known relatives (sire, dam, littermates) if you have that information — the more of a family’s structure we can see, the more useful the data.
- Optionally add standardized photos and any existing genetic test results.
Where this leads
This program moves through phenotype and pedigree collection first, on purpose. A genomic investigation — sequencing, candidate-gene analysis, anything that could produce an actual genetic-cause finding — only becomes worth considering once the collected family data itself shows a pattern informative enough to justify it, and only with qualified external genetics expertise involved at that stage. No sequencing has been purchased, no genomic analysis has begun, and no gene-discovery claim has been made for either study. If that changes, it will be stated plainly and separately from what’s written here.