We promise to get to dogs, but if you are a redhead, you’re interesting!

Less than 2% of the entire human race has red hair like you. As a redhead, you have less hair than people with other hair color (90,000 strands compared with the average of 110,000 strands that blondes have, and a brunette’s 140,000 strands). You make up for the paucity of strands by having individual strands that are thicker, and your hair color will keeps its pigment longer than other hair colors. You sense temperature changes more quickly, require 20% more anesthesia for a surgery, and bees like you more than they do people with other hair colors (but a mutation in the MC1R gene that controls hair color also controls pain response, so you might be less sensitive to a bee sting or even injections).

You’re more apt to be left-handed, you’re definitely going to have a redheaded baby if dad is a ginger, as well, and if you have blue eyes, you might as well be a unicorn because fewer than a million people have this uber rare combination of red hair and blue eye.

Do you feel special yet?

We didn’t come across any statistics involving red heads who own red coated dogs, but for now, let’s assume it’s pretty darn rare. As for red hair in dogs, genetically speaking, there are only two basic pigments that determine the color of canines: Eumelanin (black) and phaeomelanin (red). For all the incredible variations in coat color in the dog world, they are still created by these two pigments, both forms of melanin.

Phaeomelanin creates ranges of red that be from the deep red of an Irish Setter, to orange, cream, gold, yellow, or tan, the default color being gold or yellow. The intensity of the color is controlled by genes that control the phaeomelanin, and the pigment is produced only in the coat and affects only their hair color (eumelanin impacts the eye and nose color).

If you are a red head with adorable flecks across your nose, and you own a red dog,  you both have something in common: Phaeomelanin in people is responsible for freckles!

There is no quick way to go deeper into color genetics of a red dog, but you can do no better than to investigate this terrific site on genetics in dogs.

To make short work of  finding anything on the page with the word “red,” hit command + F if you’re on a Mac.

If you’re on a PC, hit Control + F. In either case, a little window should pop up and that’s where you type the word for which you are searching, in this case, “red.” Every word with “red” in it (like incredible), or the word, itself, will highlight.

Image: Irish Setter by Marsha McDonald is available as fine art and in home decor and lifestyle items here