Estimated reading time: 11 minutes
The brindle Cane Corso is the traditional color of the breed. Due to the fact this color has never been as popular as many other colors. Like a merle Cane Corso or Cane Corso formentino for example. This fact makes that brindle Cane Corsos have the average best exterior quality out of all the colors. Next to the quality of black Cane Corso, of course.
No, there is not only one type of brindle, there are 4 different types of brindle. In this article, I will talk about this color/pattern. Let’s start defining the brindle color and pattern:
- Black brindle
- Brindle
- Grey brindle
- Reverse brindle
Black brindle Cane Corso
In the black brindle Cane Corso, the basic color is black, which means that the dog’s fur consists of 80% or more black color. There are some stripes of different shades of fawn ( lighter and darker ) and/or different shades of grey over the body, and these stripes are called the pattern. It’s located usually on the sides of the dog and neck, but also sometimes it could be on the legs, topline, and skull. While the muzzle remains black. The Cane Corso puppies in this color are very quality.
Brindle Cane Corso
The brindle Cane Corso, there is no predominant color here. While black consists of 50% of the total color fur, or a bit over 50%. The other 50% might consist of fawn and/or grey stripes, lighter and darker shades. The dogs this color usually have mixed stripes of black, grey and fawn color. Out of the 4 types of brindles, this is the least popular pattern among the population worldwide. But Cane Corsos, this color, is usually high quality.
The update on this article, the explanation of the fawn and grey shades of stripes – check here.
Grey brindle Cane Corso
Maybe the most popular color of all brindles is the grey brindle Cane Corso. This color is similar to black brindle. The base of the fur is grey and it consists of 80% of the total color or even more. There are different shades of fawn or even shades of grey stripes on the body and it consists of a maximum of 20%. While the muzzle remains grey, the stripes are located on the body and legs. Breeding brindle dogs with grey females or vice versa may produce Cane Corso puppies this color.
Reverse brindle Cane Corso
The reverse brindle Cane Corso color is very rare to find in today’s specimens, but a really beautiful one. The base of the fur is fawn and consists of over 70%, while the stripes remain at 30% and are different shades of black and/or grey. There are also some shades of fawn on the body, it does not need to be solid fawn. The muzzle must stay black and not goes over the eyes line, as the standard says.
It a very hard to get this color as it seems that is not dominant, and the fact I am afraid of, this might be the next “popular” color of the Cane Corso. Backyard breeders might use crossbreeding between Cane Corso and Dogo Canario, to get this color, as many of the Canarians have this color. This will put down the breed with the quality. There are many differences between these two breeds and I will talk about them in some of the upcoming articles.
Now about exterior Cane Corso quality and colors
If we take a look at all standard and recognized colors described by AKC and FCI breed standards, due to my very high experience and knowledge about the Cane Corso breed. Seeing a lot of different quality dogs, in kennels, different breeders, on the streets, in different countries, on many dog shows, and doing research on social networks, I will present the facts about the quality of dogs of different colors on average:
- Out of 10 brindle Cane Corsos, 6 will be excellent in exterior quality.
- Out of 10 blacks, 5 will be excellent in exterior quality.
- Out of 10 greys, 3 will be excellent in exterior quality.
- Out of 10 fawns, 1 will be excellent in exterior quality.
- Out of 10 formentinos, 1 will be excellent in exterior quality.
I am not going talk about white, merle, carbon, and other non-recognized colors as they are not recognized, which means no quality.
While “popular” colors are used for breeding purposes only for one reason – color, the breeders who breed only because of the color, ignore the exterior quality which is the ID of the breed. They produce very low-quality puppies with the breeding of two very low-quality parents to get the desired color in their offspring. They do not care about the breed and make very low quality, on average. So be careful where and from whom you will buy a Cane Corso puppy.
The very true, check this:
If the color is the most important segment for you, but when your “Cane Corso” puppy turns adult age of 3 years and while you walk with your dog on the street, and when different people stop and ask you:
- “Is this a Labrador?”,
- “Where you bought this boxer?”,
- “Don’t be afraid, I just want to pet you”,
- “How cute puppy is” because the dog is small but is 3 years of age.
Do not be angry with the people, because people are not stupid! Be angry with yourself, because the only thing was the Cane Corso color you looked at puppy age and you went with the wrong breeder. Look at the quality first, and this is the recommendation from Spunk Gang! We will breed always Cane Corso quality at first! Quality with health, temperament, and exterior recognizable Cane Corso quality so everybody knows it is a CANE CORSO!
Too many errors in this text. It is not possible that the black color and the gray color are present in the dog’s coat at the same time. I chose this example and I’ll stop here, but there would be too many things to correct.
Peppino Accrogliano’ I do appreciate your feedback, neither positive nor negative. Black and grey colors may be presented in the dog’s coat at the same time in a single dog.
I am very willing to debate about details, but to make this easy, here is one of the many proofs and very visible – merle, this color/pattern consists of black and grey at the same time in a single dog, the brindle may consist black with grey stripes, the ones which aren’t fawn or shades of fawn.
To make it even easier, just google black and grey dog and you will see how many breeds have black and grey color at the same time, so genetically it is possible, and with many breeds.
Once again, thank you for your feedback! Talking at a high level and in detail, and with educational purpose, people can learn from it about dogs in general but especially about the Cane Corso breed.
It seems to me that in your article, you spoke of cane corso. True?
If so, what does the “merle” gene have to do with it? This is a mutation that does not exist in the Cane Corso breed.
And by the way, you don’t mention it in what you wrote.
And anyway, beyond any scientific consideration, the standard of the breed doesn’t foresee that on the same dog, of any permitted coat colouring, black and gray hairs may be present at the same time.
Non sono molto d accordo sulla qualità del cane in base al colore esistono cani tigrati che di salute e bellezza superano il tradizionale colore nero o formentino