long haired sheperds

Question
What are the odds of puppies being long haired if the father is a long hair?  Is there any way to tell by looking at the pups at 8 weeks if it is going to have long hair?

Answer
Hi Nancy,  the odds are very high that at least 50% of the puppies will be long hsairs, and all of them will carry the long hair gene, which means they will pass it on too.  You will see tufts in the ears of the puppies which tells you they carry the gene.  Normally your really thick coated puppies are the ones that are actually long hairs.  Rmemeber, the mom could carry the gene too which makes the odds even higher.  If she has tufts hair in the front of her ears she also carries the gene.  When you are looking at what is going to pass through to your puppies, you not only have to look at the parents, but you need to go back 3 generations as anything 3 generations back can come through.  Some things can even skip generations.   Hope this helps,

Dawn