All About Merle Schnauzers

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All rights reserved

Copyrighted 2008

By: Nancy Anderson

     I, like everyone else with the Merle Schnauzers simply LOVE the Merle pattern and couldn't believe my eyes when I saw my first one.  While I couldn't afford the first one I saw but it did capture a piece of my heart and so I began my journey of  looking for information and others who had them.  I found there were a LOT of folks crossing Pomeranians and Aussies with the Schnauzers in order to produce the Merle Pattern in their Schnauzer lines.   Their dogs weren't refined as the one I had fallen in love with and had a Fluffy and sometime curly coat which wasn't what I had in mind or intended for my breeding program.  Several years later I found a lady with the Merle Schnauzers at a tad bit more affordable price and with 3 generations documentation with ALL of the relatives on site for me to see.  Even her 1st generation CKC registered male, which she purchased out of Oklahoma had the refined look of a Schnauzer with the true wire coat.  Needless to say my wonderful journey had finally been worthwhile and I left there that day with my first Merle Miniature Schnauzer snuggled in my arms.  I have a habit of naming a lot of my dogs "OLLIE".  I can't really say why but "Ollie" just seems to fit a dog and as of the time of this article we have had 5 Ollie's and coincidentally all 5 of those have been Merle patterned dogs of several different breeds.  If I think real hard, it just seems that the Merle's we've owned have been quite the companion and go everywhere with me on the farm so I tend to talk to them like children.  I have phrases for when I've made a mistake like "What a fine mess you've gotten us into this time Ollie" . 

     I spent almost 6 months trying to track down the lineage behind Ollie.  I spent months calling registries, clubs and other breeders who might help me find the Breeder who was on the registration certificate of Ollie forefather.  Some times you just get lucky and things fall in place and that is exactly what happened when I finally found the breeder I'd spent months looking for and countless hours on the telephone trying to find.  I had been to Canton, Texas to the Trade Days there and was talking to a lot of the breeders about the Merle Schnauzers and it so happened that one of the ladies was the sister to the lady I was looking for unbeknownst to me at the time.  The breeder at Canton wasn't sure whether or not her sister wanted me to be able to get in contact with her but she had taken my name and number down for when she got a Brown/Tan Piebald female Schnauzer that I was trying to add to our little gang of dogs and early Monday morning the lady I had searched high and low for called me.  It was a very long conversation and I will be eternally grateful to her for taking the time out of her very busy schedule and footing the long distance phone bill.

     Unfortunately while every piece of the puzzle helps, I basically hit a dead end after finding Cheryl.  She was able to give me the Dog's names of her dog and the breeders name but all of those hit a dead end as they were Foundation registered Continental Kennel Club dogs with no past lineage documented and the breeder listed no longer lived at the address I found for them and I've been unable to get any more information on the bloodline and/or breeder.  Cheryl feels sure that our bloodline came from a cross with a Merle Rat Terrier as the gentleman who she bought hers from always had a lot of Rat Terriers for sale.  Now I ask you, how ironic is it that my first Merle dogs were Rat Terriers and they are what started my love for the pattern and now I've found that the Merle in the bloodline of Merle Schnauzers I own most likely came from a Merle Rat Terrier. 

     Since I started my journey down the Merle Schnauzer path back in 2002 I've talked with my share of breeders and owners of the Merle Schnauzer and I've yet to find one single person who thinks it is part of the original line of Schnauzers.  The Merle Schnauzer is without doubt a cross with another breed and being refined and bred to become a "GENETIC" purebred part of the Schnauzer breed. 

     Sometimes you have good luck and sometimes you have bad and with Ollie we had the worst luck of all.  We had just bred Ollie to his first gal when he was kicked in the head by one of our horses and killed instantly.  I was totally devastated, not only because I'd lost my beloved Ollie but that I'd spent 2 years in a dream world that I was going to help with the development of the Merle gene in the Schnauzers.  I knew I only had a slim chance that not only would Callie be bred but that the chances were even lower that she would actually have me a Merle Schnauzer puppy as well.  God does smile on some us though and Callie produced not one but two gorgeous Merle babies.  Those two babies couldn't of been bought for all of the tea in China.  Pending and Splish Splash arrived into this world under the Rainbow and they were the pot of gold that we were given.

     Pending has produced us 3 litters of gorgeous babies.  His first litter there were several males that we sold to loving homes.  In the second litter there was one little male of which we currently have "Beau Jangles" who seems is going to be a gorgeous guy and in the TOY size.  How lucky can one person get?  Pending's third litter came as a complete shock but a joyous one.  In this litter there were 7 puppies of which 6 were Merles.  We kept 2 of those females who are "Attie" and "Ishi".

     We have found in just the very short time that we've been breeding the Merles that they are wonderful companion, have all of the eagerness to please of the original Schnauzer and have all of the bonuses that come with the Schnauzer breed such as hypo-allergenic and shed-free.  We have yet to produce a SOFT coated Merle but in all honesty we prefer the original Wire coats in our Schnauzers as they are easier maintenance and their hair doesn't mat like the Soft coats do.  What most people don't know is that a Schnauzer is supposed to be stripped and not shaved and if a wire coat is shaved over and over that their hair becomes softer with each shaving but still keeping the slow growing benefit of the wire coat.

     We want everybody to keep in mind though that the MERLE Schnauzers are a development in progress and still need more refining to become show quality Schnauzers.  They also will produce offspring that either does not fit the original breed standard markings such as some will have Mask and the colors are becoming more varied as we are starting to see a few Reddish tinted ones.  Keep in mind however that at one time there were Schnauzers being registered as RED so it's entirely possible that with the added gene pool that a resurfacing of Red Schnauzers may be in the works.  It will be up to each individual breeder of the Merles to determine if they want to cull those not recognized at this time or to continue to develop those further as well.  Depending on which BREED those dogs makeup is will determine what will be produced for multiple generations from that bloodline.

For example - with the Pomeranian gene pool addition you could see a variety of colors surface such as Blue, Red, Crème and Tan to name just a few.  With the Rat Terrier gene pool addition you could also see Blue, Red and Fawns in the future.  With Aussies gene pool more Reds could surface. 

Not only will the Color and Patterns of the coat be affected by the addition of the different breeds but the coat texture and length will under go a change as well.  With the Rat Terrier, it has been my experience that it tends to lead to staying with the original Wire coat.  With Pomeranians and Aussie you see more of the soft coat with a faster growing and longer coat with more fullness to it.  If your not looking for higher maintenance then the Pom or Aussie line would not be what you would want.  

     With the development being fairly new we can not be certain with will surface in the Color area in generations to come but will openly evaluate those offspring to their ability to benefit the breed in the overall scheme of things.  It might be that we can also separate these dogs from the Schnauzer breed and form a breed of their own as was done with the Merle Min Pins becoming Harlequin Pinschers and the German Parti Yorkies becoming Biewer Yorkies.

     With the Merle gene inclusion into the breed we have to remember to be responsible breeders of the gene as it is a semi-lethal gene and should NEVER be bred back to its MERLE self.  There is no responsible reason to breed 2 merles together as 1 merle parent will produce just as many Merle offspring as 2 will.  With proper responsible breeding of the Merles, no harm will come to the breed now or in the future.

     If your interested in the Merle Schnauzer and being a part of it's development and continued existence or just a proud owner of one as a pet then we'd be glad to help you in any way that we can.   We want every breeder to be an INFORMED, productive and conscientious breeder of the dogs that we dearly love.  What little we know we will openly and honestly share with others.  We know that the Merle Schnauzer is not for everyone just as it seems that the WIRE coat wasn't for everybody either as somewhere along the line here in America breeders took it upon themselves to cross to dogs with softer coats to produce the Soft Coated Schnauzer.  Years after the first cross, Americans and others around the world have opened their minds and hearts to the Soft Coated Schnauzer and accepted it as a Purebred.  We can only hope that the Merle Schnauzer will be accepted in the same fashion or given it's own breed designation in which to continue it's survival.

     It amazes me how few breeds of dogs there are that were American developments.  Americans seem to take the attitude that if we cross 2, 3 or 4 dogs and then try to develop a new breed that those doing it are irresponsible breeders and bad breeders yet they embrace dogs developed in Foreign countries and shipped here with the SAME background development.  Closed mind or Ignorance?  Either way it's not acceptable in my way of thinking.  I'm here to LEARN, to keep an OPEN MIND and to share what knowledge I do get with others.  Closed minds are for those who can not see beyond their own wants, needs and desires.  Ignorance is simply a choice that some make and there is no excuse for Ignorance in today's society.

     EVERY dog is a CROSS of several other breeds and the Merle Schnauzer has the same humble beginnings.

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