Originally posted by clara4457


Correct me if I am wrong, but these breeders seemed to be willing to do this to improve their show quality rather than their health quality. Isn't there a risk that these genes will be passed on to future generations even though they may not show up in some pups? Now I may be totally off the mark as I don't know anything about breeding, but it seems pretty risky to me.
Actually a double merle can't pass any problems onto it's pups unless it's being bred to a merle or another double merle and results in more double merle pups. It's because the problems result from the lack of pigment -- if the pups are solid coloured or in most cases regular merles, they won't have the same problems because they will have more pigment (Solids and regular merles can have the same problems of course, but they result from other stimuli or heredities).