This is a post written by Elaine Hu
The sheepcoat is a very rare, very special coat type. They have charcoal grey ears instead of the usual black and tan, and legs are blonde, almost like a Wheaten. This special coat is ALL undercoat, and is very dense and curly. It's hard to explain unless you've touched one. Their coat has almost the exact same density and texture as a poodle's coat. It soaks in water like no other. This is a very rare coat because breeders don't like the coat. Most try as best as they could to breed it out of the line. However, it still crops up from time to time. Some believe it is a throwback from their Otterhound ancestry as the sheepcoats are only observed in Airedales, not Welshes or other terriers. There are several reasons why breeders don't like the coat; one, it doesn't conform to the breed standard, two, it traps heat (horribly), mud, dirt, burrs, sand, water, you name it, and three, it doesn't come out nearly as easily (or at all!!!) as the normal coated Airedales, thus making escape from vermin more difficult. You CANNOT strip a sheepcoated Airedale, it would be a torture for them.
I had a conversation with Jane Harvey, an Australian Airedale breeder of over 80 champions and a well respected International Judge. This was what she had to say about the sheepcoats:
"These seem to crop up from time to time and are not the desired coat for the breed. In fact, these coats completely lack the top coat. An Airedale's coat was originally designed to come out in the claws of the digging animals he was bred to chase. So, an extension of a non-moulting coat was selected for, where the coat had to be 'tugged' before it came out. So, this feature became the Airedale's natural defence against the predators he was used to hunt. That is why it is recommended that the coat be hand stripped. The hardness of the coat was selected for as a feature of the breed. But along with the best of coats, breeders found these sheep coats cropped up from time to time. Sheep coated puppies are the prettiest and most appealing of them all! But their grooming is always time consuming and a headache.
It is a mystery where these sheepcoats come from. I believe it is from a genetic mutation of come sort. Because a sheepcoated Airedale's coat is quite unlike any other breed's coat. I have observed that sheepcoated puppies occur in litters where the hardest of coats also appear. Airedales are not the only breed that has this type of problem -German Shepherds can produce incorrect coats - a long coated version as can Welsh Corgi's both Cardigan and Pembroke. And these breeds are certainly unrelated to Airedales!"
So who knows? Mutation, Otterhound, etc.
The best way to tell if an Airedale is a true sheepcoat is to look at the ears. A true sheepcoated Airedale will retain the dark/charcoal colouring in the ears throughout his/her lifetime. Sunshade is 12.5, and yup, we still have charcoal ears :-)
The picture here features 6 different sheepcoated Airedales. We have Camilla Murphy's Rogue @ 6 months, Maureen Scott's Courtney aka LL pictured @ 10 yrs. Sue Forrester's handsome Aerem pictured @ 10 yrs old at a dog show where he won Best Veteran (how cool that you can show a sheepie in Oz?), Denise Keith's Noah @ 10 years, my Sunshade girl pictured @ 12 yrs old, and her brother Winston pictured @ 10 yrs old. Sunshade and Winston were the two sheepcoated pups out of a litter of 8. Sunshade was supposedly the pick female that the breeder was hoping to keep. FORTUNATELY, she had to be let go due to her "bad" coat. Notice how they all have dark/charcoal ears?
One observation that I have made on the sheepcoats is that they hide age VERY well. All the dogs in the picture, with the exception of baby Rogue (you're lucky you're in Oz, or he would be in danger of being dognapped by me!!), were pictured at 10 yrs and over. Yet they look no more than 5 yrs old!
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