Usually dogs that will have a silky coat when grown will have a thinner looking coat as a puppy. Those puppies with thick bear looking coats with heavy leg furnishings usually turn out of be cottony. Looking at the parents helps. A silky coat is cool to touch and feels very silky. If you lift the coat on the shoulder it should just fall back into place and not clump up when you release it. Many breeders breed all types of coats: silky, cottony, soft coated, woolly, and coarse. Unless you know the ancestry behind the parents, even if they have silky coats, you can still end up with a cottony coat or some other type. Another thing, silky coats are very tough and do not break easily. Dogs with other types of coat have a hard time getting any length to their coat because the coat breaks off. It is just very hard to tell about coat on a 12 week old puppy unless you know it comes from a long line of silky coats. |