Page 21 - THE SLOUGHI REVIEW Issue 15

T H E S L O U G H I R E V I E W 2 1

Loofah Al Khalij around 1980, she was feathered on ears and tail,
unknown photographer

At this point, the letter must be briefly interrupted: Dr. Burchard describes the type of
Salukis of the Arabian Peninsula differently than the Swiss board of the SKG seems to
have understood him. This may be due to the fact that the traditional types of dogs are

judged by the Bedouins not so much by their appearance according to a standard, but by
their character and the way they are used. So the judgement is not based on a phenotype,
as is the case with us, but on its abilities. We remember the comparison with the
Rottweiler, which has only been bred according to the FCI standard since 1955.

In his letter to Mr Weber, Burchard writes that "the Saudi Arabian Salukis show great
variations in their coat, although their type is otherwise quite uniform. Varieties also occur
within a single Bedouin tribe, even within a single breeding line."

Thus, both predominantly feathered and smooth types can occur on the Arabian
Peninsula, even within a single litter. This defines the type of Saluki from the Arabian
Peninsula, which cannot be described as a "smooth transition" to the Sloughi, because the
different coat types of the Saluki can still appear after generations in the case of recessive
inheritance of feathering. These Salukis are heterozygous.

The types of Salukis found on the Arabian Peninsula therefore show feathering on the tail
and ears, and there are also completely smooth forms in individual families and even
single individuals in a litter. There is therefore no question of a transition from the
Saluki with feathering to the smooth Sloughi. Otherwise, both Salukis and Sloughis

would be born in one litter, which can simply be described as unlikely.