This may be a breed with which some of you are unfamiliar, and its name won’t help you here. This is the fearless Blue Lacy, and as evidenced by our photo, it’s not always blue.

Half the breed’s name refers to the Lacy brothers, Frank, George, and Harry, who in the 1850s headed to Texas with the dogs they developed into a droving breed of exceptional quality. The other half of the name refers to the blue gene each dog carries, the light gun-metal gray to almost-black classified in color as blue. Some Lacys exhibit the unusual slate blue coat and nose, but it’s a genetic rarity. There are other colors! Red, and yellow-to-cream Lacy’s are classified in color as red. Lacys with red markings over their eyes, on muzzle, under tail, and down the legs are classified as “tri” colored.

No one likes to appear uninformed, so we pass along “inside baseball” about what owners call their breed. One source we found wrote that Lacy descendants referred to the dogs as, “Lacy Dogs,” “Lacy Hog Dogs,” or “Lacys,” but not “Blue Lacys.” Ranchers in the Hill Country that have been breeding the breed for decades call their dogs, “Lacys,” or “Lacy Dogs.” The breed name that  encompasses all three acceptable colors, is simply “Lacy,” or “Lacy Dog.”

The “take-away” message in our research is that “insiders” call their dogs, “Lacys,” though we confess that we’re partial to “Blue Lacy.” Doesn’t everything sound better with a color attached?  Blue Lagoon, Red Velvet Cake, Purple Rain, green cash…..