Whitehead

Whitehead describes a phenotype that creates white areas on the face and body. Unlike piebald spotting, whitehead causes white markings to appear from the head rearwards.

Content

What is Whitehead?

Whitehead causes white markings on the chest, front legs, and face, often with white over both eyes. But extended versions of whitehead can also cover the rest of the dog’s body.

In some of the dogs with a whitehead pattern, the white markings grow large enough to not only cover the face but also the neck, chest, and front legs.

White can even extend beyond the withers and can cause white on the belly, flanks, back, or loins until the front half or the full body is predominantly white.

All in all, whitehead can cause many different phenotypes:

The genetics behind a whitehead phenotype have not been identified yet (head over to the canine whitehead research website or GoFundMe to learn more).

We can’t explain the exact mechanism causing the whitehead phenotype. But we do know that it works separately from the piebald phenotypes found in many different breeds.

In dogs with regular white spotting, the color begins to disappear from the chest, legs and tail upwards. Typically, the head is the last body part to lose color on a dog with piebald. But on a dog with whitehead, the head is the first area to lose pigment!

Whitehead can be hard to distinguish from other patterns like Irish spotting or piebald. And even some merle phenotypes can contribute to white spotting.

And of course, dogs with whitehead can also be merle, piebald or Irish-spotted at the same time which makes it virtually impossible to attribute white markings to one cause or the other.

How does Whitehead look?

Whitehead creates many patterns that are considered as mismarks.

Whitehead markings are associated with an extended amount of face white. But some whitehead phenotypes are more subtle than others:

front-heavy white, e.g. a white chest or front legs, while having solid back legs
white around the lips/beyond the corner of the mouth
split face
eye patch
asymmetrical/crooked blazes
very wide “hourglass” or “panda” blazes
blaze connects to white collar
all-white face

A high amount of face white can sometimes cause blue eyes, pink skin, and nose spots. The lack of pigment can also increase the risk for a puppy to suffer from congenital deafness.

Areas that hold on to pigment the best are usually found around the eyes and ears.

More subtle expressions of whitehead are easily missed. But mating two affected dogs can result in puppies with a surprisingly high amount of white.

Whitehead is an inheritable trait that seems to work in an incomplete dominant manner. But its expression is not fully predictable and seems to be controlled by unknown modifiers.

Affected dogs don’t produce a distinct pattern in all their offspring, e.g. you can’t accurately predict if a dog with a split face will also produce puppies with a split face.

Breeds With Whitehead

Whitehead patterns are found in many dog breeds from very different breed groups^[1]. In some of these breeds, whitehead is very common. In others, it happens only rarely.

Since many of the affected breeds also very often come with piebald or other traits, the additional white markings on the muzzle or forehead from whitehead don’t stand out that much.

Whitehead becomes most obvious if it creates split face patterns, very wide blazes, or asymmetrical blazes. or all-white faces on otherwise well-pigmented dogs.

Whitehead In Herding Breeds

Whitehead occurs in very many herding breeds. Most Australian Shepherds and Border Collies have it. And the white front in Old English Sheepdogs is one of the breed’s hallmark traits.

Australian Koolie
Australian Shepherd
Bearded Collie
Border Collie
Cardigan Welsh Corgi
English Shepherd
Miniature American Shepherd
Old English Sheepdog
Pembroke Welsh Corgi
Rough Collie
Shetland Sheepdog
Smooth Collie

Whitehead In Mountain Dogs

About all Swiss Mountain Dogs get their white from a contained version of whitehead that was selectively bred to not get too large. But sometimes, the whitehead pattern gets “out of control” and creates obvious mismarks with too much white on the head.

Bernese Mountain Dog
Great Swiss Mountain Dog
St. Bernard

Whitehead In Terriers

Many of the white terrier and bull-type terrier breeds have extended piebald patterns. This can make added white caused by whitehead harder to spot.

American Pit Bull Terrier
American Staffordshire Terrier
Bull Terrier
Fox Terrier (Smooth)
Fox Terrier (Wire)
Jack Russell Terrier
Miniature Bull Terrier
Parson Russell Terrier
Staffordshire Bull Terrier

Whitehead In Bulldogs

Whitehead happens very frequently in a variety of bully breeds:

American Bulldog
American Bully
Alapaha Bulldog
Boston Terrier
Boxer
English Bulldog
French Bulldog
Olde English Bulldogge

Whitehead in Spitz-Type Breeds

Even some old or even primitive dog breeds can sport a whitehead pattern:

American Akita
Finnish Lapphund
German Spitz
Icelandic Sheepdog
Karelain Bear Dog
Yakutian Laika

Whitehead In Hunting Dogs

Some hunting breeds from very different breed backgrounds can have a whitehead phenotype:

Basset Hound
Beagle
Catahoula Leopard Dog
English Springer Spaniel
German Hound
Spanish Water Dog
Welsh Springer Spaniel

Whitehead In Companion Dogs

Many of the smaller toy breeds show the occasional whitehead pattern. But many of these breeds have extended piebald (which can also add face white), so it’s hard to see.