Labrador Retrievers: Coat color=intelligence/temerament? Huh?

Factual Questions
1

Some people I know, my girlfriend among others, have stated to me emphatically that the color of the breed (black, yellow, chocolate) determines the intelligence of the dog. Black is supposedly the most intelligent, yellow is supposedly not so bright.

I’ve told them that I believe this to be bullsh*t and am now researching it. However, I cannot for the life of me find anything that agrees with their views. I’ve emailed a couple of website owners that seem to be very knowledgable about the breed and am awaiting a response.

So now I pose this question to the smartest people on terra firma. Any lab owners on here that also subscribe to this theory? Any basis for the theory?

Is it true? If so can you provide more then just a belief that it’s true? or perhaps something that debunks it?

Thanks all!

Happy New Year!

2

Only speaking from experience, no cite:

Every yellow lab I’ve known (three, all of different lineage) have been dopey, sluggish in movement, thoroughly lovey-dovey, lap dogs if you would let them.

The only chocolate I’ve known was high-strung, wacky, LET’S PLAY NOW!!!, but slightly brighter than the yellows.

The two blacks were less high strung than the chocolate and certainly more intelligent than either the chocolate or the yellows.

3

I don’t think that intelligence is determined by coat color. A lab’s color is determined by three alleles: black, chocolate and yellow.

[Short genetics refresher]
One allele is inherited from each parent. These alleles combine to determine a particular trait - eye color, height, whatever. Dominant alleles muscle out other allele types (e.g., the human “brown eye” allele is dominant over the “blue eye” one, so if you have one “brown eye” allele, you’ll be brown eyed no matter what other allele you get). Recessive alleles must both be present for that trait to show (e.g, the human “blue eye” allele is recessive, so someone with blue eyes must have two “blue eye” alleles, one from each parent).
[/Short genetics refresher]

Black is dominant over chocolate, both are dominant over yellow. So, black/black, black/chocolate, and black/yellow labs will all have black coats (these alleles don’t exactly make nice 1:1 pairs, but we don’t need to worry about that). However, these labs will only share one common allele, so it is unlikely that they would have the same level of intelligence. Thus, intelligence isn’t determined by coat color, unless it is directly linked to this one, specific allele.

On the other hand, intelligence is probably inherited in a more general manner. So, if you had a dumb mother, and a dumb father, no one would be surprised if they had dumb pups. If both mother and father are yellow, then they could have a bunch of all-yellow, all-dumb pups. This could be the basis for your friends’ theory.

Finally, Googling labrador “which color” yields a handful of second-hand fan sites that state color has no affect on personality.

4

We had a black that was so smart I know she understood whatever we said to her. She was really a sweet dog and had a quiet temperment. She didn’t care for hunting much and would take ducks back to the closest shore not to where the guys were.

We now have a chocolate and he is also a loving dog. He does hunt very well and has a lot of energy. But dumb as a brick. My husband says it’s like having a retarded child in the house. (His brother is retarded and he likens it to that.)

My sister-in-law has a yellow and we dog-sat it for 10 weeks one summer. I’ll never own a yellow lab. He was so hyper and naughty, chewed things hanging from the ceiling and even the wires under the truck for the trailer lights. He is really a dumb dog. A friend recently got a yellow from a breeder/trainer and that dog acts just like the dog my sister-in-law has. I had to ask him not to bring it over anymore because it has no manners.

When the time comes we will get another black lab. They are the best IMO.

5

Our yellow lab is dumb as a stump. And we’re talking about stumps in the lower percentages, I.Q.-wise.

6

Hmm well my dog’s been in doggy school for almost 2 years now. We’ve been with one completely spazzy chocolate and one smart, mellow chocolate. We’ve also been with the laziest, biggest yellow lab. So I cna attest to yellows being sweet and slow but the chocolates are polar opposites.

Oh, the chocolate in our neighborhood is a spazz.

7

As a longtime owner of a Golden and cousin-once-removed of a breeder of Goldens, I’ve known a lot of retrievers over the years (though strangely enough no chocolate Labs). My own (anecdotal) experience has been:

–There’s no clear correlation between color and intelligence.

–Yellow Labs tend to be affectionate and playful; while black Labs. enjoy a good romp, they tend to be a bit more aloof, better guard or working dogs. Both colors have the temperament to be good family pets, but in slightly different ways.

–There are of course exceptions to the generalization in the last point, which do not affect its validity as a generalization of my experience. (But others’ MMV!)

8

I have two labs, one black and one yellow. The yellow lab is one of the most intelligent dogs I have ever had. The black lab is as dumb as a box of rocks. He is not hyper or naughty - he is a really very good dog. However, he is a few clowns short of a circus. The whole fetch/chase the ball thing has him completely baffled (“wait, you want me to do what?”), and if you toss food to him it will bounce off of his nose and land on the floor. After he realizes that something has hit him, it slowly dawns on him that there is food on the floor in front of him. Although he is not sure how it got there, he is certainly grateful for it magically appearing there.

and I would not trade him for the world.

So, to answer the OP, my experience has been just the opposite. Yellow lab = smart. Black lab = dumb.

9

I’ve met dozens of labs and their close cousins, golden retrievers. I have met dumb dogs of all colors, and smart dogs of nearly all colors (the smart are the minority, just like with people). I have a feeling that dog owners who realize they have a smart dog will unintentionally “smarten up” other dogs of the same color, seeing selectively only the acts that reinforce their perception that they made a “good choice” going with the color they picked.

Likewise, owners with dumb dogs will see the actions of other, similar dogs as “dumber”, to reinforce their belief that as soon as they chose a dog like theirs, they were fated to receive a dumb dog.

In reality, I suspect the percentages are insignificantly different between colors of dogs. And as far as the “alleles” go, I thought the chocolate labs (aka Chesapeake retrievers) were a combination of a curly-haired Golden Retriever and a black lab, and not true Labradors. I seem to remember Michener’s book “Chesapeake” describing the introduction of the chocolate lab to the Delmarva area in the 1900s.

The only certainty is that golden retrievers are WAY smarter than labs. :slight_smile:

10

I’ve heard something similar regarding Portuguese Water Dogs, a breed that is closely related to the Poodle.

Black dominant = very intelligent
Brown dominant = pretty smart
White dominant/parti = took the short bus to water trials

I’ve got two white/black partis, both of which are quite intelligent. Like kallie describes, they understand just about everything you tell them. However, they don’t like swimming, something that is considered very un-Portie-like.

One of Guinness and Bailey’s playmates was a short, chubby yellow lab from across the street. The dog was a sweetheart who lived to eat and swim, and she seemed quite Beagle-like in intelligence.

11

Thanks for all your responses. While there doesn’t seem to be a consenus, it is obvious to me that color is not a factor. This is the email I received from the owner of this website: http://www.blueknightlabs.com/

If you look at the site I think you will agree this person knows what she is talking about and what she says makes perfect sense. Even a yahoo/google search on her name shows she has raised many Champions.

Although, I mainly was reasearching for my own knowledge because no amount of proof will convince some people. i.e “don’t confuse me with the facts”. I suppose this thread can be locked or moved to Great Debates (although “great” it doesn’t seem to me to be)

the email:

Keith,

Once upon a time, Chocolate Labs were the bastard child of the breed. Therefore, the gene pool was rather narrow. The dogs of that color tended to be rather busy by nature, and we joked about their lack of attention span, and referred to their antics as being the result of “Brown Brains”. It was, more likely, due to the inherited temperaments of those limited gene pools. That was a LONG time ago. Now, the gene pool for chocolates is vast indeed – and blacks and chocolates come out of the same litters, and have the same intelligence and temperaments as their ‘other’ color littermates. Yellows are no different. I do not believe there has ever been a scientific study linking coat color and gray matter, therefore, you are dealing with breeder urban legend.

I laugh to think that one could really believe that if there was a litter of all three colors, that only the coat color would determine the intelligence of the dogs in that litter. If that were so, one would never want a black who carried chocolate, for fear that the chocolate factor would produce a dingy black, or that lazy yellow gene would cause the dog to be a couch potato… God forbid the black puppy carried all three colors, because it would be one lazy/dumb black indeed <G>.

I rather liken the reference to intelligence being linked to coat color, as the same as we have in humans… we’ve all heard of dumb blonds, fiery red-heads, and smart brunettes… however, we all know stupid brunettes, smart blonds, and calm red-heads. Hair color and brain cells are not related to the best of my knowledge. Temperament and intelligence are inherited, and often folks stick to a color preference in their dogs. Those
breeders center on a specific color, will find that the temperament and intelligence of their lines, will be passed on to the dogs of that color, however, the color in itself, is not a part of the IQ.

I own all three colors. I have some blacks who are as dumb as a brick, some who are as smart as a whip, and I have chocolates and yellows that fit into the same categories. That being said, we STILL joke about brown brains, just as we enjoy telling blond jokes.

:slight_smile:
Dian Welle
Blue Knight Labradors