Chocolate roan Cocker Spaniel

• Blue roan
• Liver roan, sometimes referred to as chocolate roan (and in some countries it is confusingly referred to as red roan)
• Orange roan (with black pigmentation)
• Orange roan (with brown pigmentation)
• Lemon roan (with black pigmentation)
• Lemon roan (with light brown pigmentation) This colour is the most recessive of all the roans

Light Blue Roan Dog

If the parents both carry the gene for "tan markings" all of the above mentioned roans may be found with a tan masking over the head and either whole tan or partly tan in the usual tan trim areas. In the orange roan it is often indistinguishable to our eyes from the rest of the coat colour. In the lemon roan, the tan mask and trim will be expressed in the dilute form of pale cream, again almost matching the body coat. The tanned areas may appear as solid or roaned areas.

The factor for "roaning" is the most dominant of the particolour patterns as we know them. It seems to be a gene with a wide spectrum of variety in how it is expressed. Some roans are quite deep with a high proportion of black (in the blues), liver (in the liver/chocolate roans), orange (the counterpart of red) or lemon (the counterpart of golden) hairs compared to white hairs present in the roaned areas of the skin. There seems to be every combination of proportion of these mixed hairs right from very, very dark roan down to the lightest of roans in all of these colours where the white hairs are present in much higher proportion than the coloured hairs on the roaned areas of the coat. In general the darker roans are dominant over the more lightly marked roans.

The areas of black (or liver/chocolate, orange or lemon) patching usually will cover the ears, both sides of the skull and around the root of the tail. There may be patches of colour anywhere else over the neck, legs, body and hindquarters. These markings may be partially or wholly absent with roaned areas in their place. The head may present as solid black but the most usual form is for a flash or blaze of roan to cover the majority of the muzzle and run up between the eyes, over the stop to the back skull. At this point, in the darker roans it would be usual for the head markings on the side of the skull to join over the occiput and in the lighter roans (or at least those light roans with few body patches) it is often the case that the blaze runs over the occiput with either no spot or...