The color of a dog may dictate how long it lives, a new study suggests.<\/p>\n
In the study, a team of researchers led by the University of Sydney found that chocolate Labradors live significantly less<\/a> than their black and yellow counterparts.<\/p>\n Published in the open access journal Canine Genetics and Epidemiology<\/a>, the study reveals how overusing dogs with popular traits may cause health problems.<\/p>\n The study first started in the UK with colleagues from the Royal Veterinary College through a VetCompass\u2122 Programme,<\/a> which collects and analyzes electronic patient data on dogs.<\/p>\n \u201cI helped to set-up VetCompass in the UK some years ago and was keen to see what its data revealed about Labradors in general,\u201d said lead researcher Paul McGreevy<\/a>, a professor of animal behavior and animal welfare science at the University of Sydney.<\/p>\n According to the paper\u2019s companion piece on The Conversation<\/a>, written by McGreevy and \u00a0co-author Bethany Wilson<\/a>, an honorary affiliate at the University of Sydney, the researchers looked at the UK veterinary records of more than 33,320 Labrador retrievers through the VetCompass<\/a> program.<\/p>\n Then, they extracted data on death and disease from a random sample of 2,074 (6.2 percent) of these dogs.<\/p>\n They found that chocolate Labradors not only live less but also are more likely to have ear infections and skin disease than their black and yellow counterparts.<\/p>\n In the UK, the median life expectancy of non-chocolate Labradors is 12.1 years, more than 10 percent longer than those with chocolate coats.<\/p>\n The prevalence of ear inflammation (otitis externa) was twice as high in chocolate Labradors, who were four times more likely to have suffered from pyotraumatic dermatitis (also known as hot-spot).<\/p>\n Across the entire Labrador population, the most common health conditions found were obesity, ear infections and joint conditions.<\/p>\n The prevalence was higher among male dogs who had been neutered.<\/p>\n \u201cWe found that 8.8 percent of UK Labradors are overweight or obese, one of the highest percentages among dog breeds in the VetCompass\u2122 database,\u201d McGreevy said in a statement.<\/p>\n The researchers were surprised because they found nothing similar in their previous studies with pugs or Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.<\/p>\n As part of VetCompass Australia, which operates as a consortium comprising all of Australia\u2019s veterinary schools and is supported by the Australian Research Council, the team is currently researching if the UK findings also holds true for Labradors in Australia, where Labradors are the most popular breed of dogs.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are currently undertaking a parallel study of Labrador retrievers in Australia to establish whether or not these colour-related differences persist in the relatively isolated Australian population,\u201d McGreevy said.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we fail to find the same differences (in Australian Labradors), this may point to the overuse of certain breeding lines in the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n Currently, seven different veterinary schools in Australia are looking into local breed-specific data to look for other health problems related to coat colors.<\/p>\n The researchers suggest that the health problems in chocolate Labradors may be pertinent to overuse of their genes.<\/p>\n Because chocolate is a recessive gene, meaning both parents must carry it, gene pool for chocolate Labradors becomes shallower and breeders often end up overusing dogs that they know for sure have the recessive gene.<\/p>\n \u201cIt may be that the resulting reduced gene pool includes a higher proportion of genes conducive to ear and skin conditions,\u201d McGreevy said in a statement.<\/p>\n So, what should breeders do?<\/p>\n \u201cBreeders could focus more on selecting for good temperament and health, but only if less attention were paid to superficial traits,\u201d McGreevy and Wilson advised in their article for The Conversation.<\/p>\n \u201cAfter all, a dog can never be the \u2018wrong\u2019 colour.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The color of a dog may dictate how long it lives, a new study suggests. In the study, a team of researchers led by the University of Sydney found that chocolate Labradors live significantly less than their black and yellow counterparts. Published in the open access journal Canine Genetics and Epidemiology, the study reveals how […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":27278,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[230,229],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-lead-stories"],"aioseo_notices":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg",830,533,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog-224x144.jpg",224,144,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog-300x193.jpg",300,193,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg",830,533,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg",830,533,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg",830,533,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg",830,533,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"Hyeyeun Jeon","author_link":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/author\/hyeyeun-jeon\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"The color of a dog may dictate how long it lives, a new study suggests. In the study, a team of researchers led by the University of Sydney found that chocolate Labradors live significantly less than their black and yellow counterparts. Published in the open access journal Canine Genetics and Epidemiology, the study reveals how…","featured_media_src_url":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/dog.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/60"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27268"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27268\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27278"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The study<\/b><\/h2>\n
The result<\/b><\/h2>\n
Following popular demand<\/b><\/h2>\n