Thanks to a breeding programme 15 years in the making, a black Labrador has given birth to a multi-coloured litter of yellow, chocolate and black puppies.
Zola, four, had a total of ten pups who are a mixture of three different colours – only seen on a ‘handful’ of occasions before.
Owners Tina Davis, 62, and her husband Martin Davis, 63, first started breeding with a female chocolate Lab in 2006.
Over the years, they’ve bred a combination of chocolate, yellow and black Labs and ultimately decided to strategically breed pups to produce a litter of all three.
Retired hotelier Tina, from Horsham, West Sussex, said: ‘We’ve always loved dogs, and when a friend decided to go abroad she had to rehome her two chocolate labs.
‘Chocolate Labs are not renowned for being good gun dogs, and we wanted to prove that with the right breeding, they could be up to the job.
‘Things just progressed from there, and we started breeding a variety of different coloured Labs.
‘We’d planned to produce a boy and a girl capable of giving all three colours since the day we started breeding, and now we’ve finally done it.
‘Only a tiny handful of Labradors have the genetic predisposition to produce all three colours, and even less are mated to a partner dog to make this happen.
‘Labradors can often carry a lot of genetic problems, so it’s not just about the colours, you have to make sure you’re producing a healthy puppy too.’
The ten adorable pups – two yellow, three chocolate and five black – were born on October 18 and have already been matched to forever homes.
The father of Zola’s pups is a black Labrador called Rocks, three, who belongs to Diana Stevens, who owns the stud farm the Davis’ have used since they started breeding.
Rocks had also been uniquely bred to carry all three colour genes.
Poor Zola had a tough pregnancy, with the pups having to be delivered by C-section, so Tina’s decided not to breed from her anymore.
However, in a few years time, she plans to breed from one of Zola’s daughters, with 50% of this special litter having the DNA to produce all three colours themselves.
‘By successfully breeding a litter of different colours, we now have the right line to continue to do this which we’re extremely pleased about,’ Tina said.
‘If we wanted to, we could sell this litter for a much higher price as they now carry extremely valuable genetics – but we’re not interested in the money.
‘We’d much rather see our Labs go to a loving home and a good family who are committed to having a dog.
‘Our puppies are not designer dogs to be shown off or used as an accessory, and we feel very strongly about that.
‘Zola had a difficult time of it this time around, and it was very stressful for us both, so we’re planning to take a bit of a break before we breed again.
‘But whatever colour each of our puppies come out, we know they’ll all make amazing pets for whatever family they go to.’
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