What colors do Miniature Poodles come in?

What colors can a Poodle be?

Any solid color, as long as it's even all the way to the skin. For a Miniature that includes apricot, black, blue, brown, cafe au lait, cream, gray, red, silver, silver beige and white. The Toy, the Miniature and the Standard are one breed in three sizes, so a Mini can be any color a Standard can.

The nose, lips and eye rims matter too. Black, blue, gray, silver, cream and white Poodles have them in black, with very dark eyes, while browns and cafe au laits have them in liver with dark amber eyes. Apricot is the in-between case, where black is preferred and liver is allowed but not wanted. Red is a solid color like the rest.

Can a Miniature Poodle be two colors?

It can be registered, and it can't be shown. A Poodle whose coat isn't one even, solid color, and carries two or more colors instead, is called parti-colored, and white is usually one of them, so a black and white Poodle is the classic case.

A two-color Miniature Poodle can still be registered, in coats such as black and white, red and white, brown and white, and black and tan, among others. A dog show judges each dog against its breed's ideal, so a two-color Mini can carry papers and live as a family companion without ever entering that ring.

What is the difference between an apricot and a red Poodle?

The difference is depth of color, because apricot and red are the same color and red is the deeper of the two. Apricot is a soft, medium orange, much like the fruit it's named for.

White, cream, apricot and red Poodles all get their color from the same red and yellow pigment, and a dog that makes only that pigment can land anywhere from white to deep red. Darker Poodles don't have more color cells than paler ones, they just pack more color into each hair. Several genes working together decide how deep that color runs.

What about black, white and brown Miniature Poodles?

All three are solid colors, each with its own coloring on the face. A black Poodle has a black nose, lips and eye rims, black or matching toenails and very dark eyes, and a white has exactly the same. A brown has a liver-colored nose, lips and eye rims, with dark toenails and dark amber eyes. Cafe au lait has that same liver coloring, and the color itself is a rich light brown, close to the French coffee it's named for, about equal parts coffee and milk.

The wrong color of nose, lips or eye rims for the coat is a big fault in the show ring, so they're worth a look on any puppy you're considering. White sits at the palest end of the same color range as apricot and red, so the gap between a white Poodle and a red one comes down to how much color the coat carries.

Will a Poodle puppy's color change as it grows?

Nobody can give a timeline for a puppy's coat, so we don't promise that it will lighten or deepen with age. What grown Poodles do show is shading. In blues, grays, silvers, browns, cafe au laits, apricots and creams, the coat may show different shades of the same color, often as slightly darker feathering on the ears and darker tips on the ruff, the thick hair around the neck. Clear colors are preferred, and that natural shading still isn't a fault.

We estimate each puppy's grown color from its mama and papa, and our health guarantee page says plainly how far that estimate can go. That's one reason you choose at 4 to 5 weeks and not on the day the litter arrives, since a coat shows more of itself by then. Your puppy comes home with you at 9 weeks.

Which colors do we raise, and can I reserve by color?

We raise apricot and red, with a white every once in a while. Our pairings aren't left to chance. Where we have DNA results for a mama and papa, they help us plan the colors a litter may carry, and we are working toward health testing all of our mamas and papas, with the certificates we have posted on each parent's page.

Our Mini Poodles are also the parents of the Cavapoos and F1B Mini Goldendoodles we raise, so a Poodle parent's color is part of what those puppies inherit. Our Cavapoo and Mini Goldendoodle guides cover those crosses.

You can reserve by color. Tell us on the application which color you have your heart set on, in the part that asks you to describe your dream puppy. Once we've approved you, we can hold a puppy for you by gender and color from the day it's born, and the choosing happens at 4 to 5 weeks. A $200 non-refundable deposit holds a place on the waiting list for a litter that has not been born yet. How big they grow is in our Mini Poodle size and lifespan guide, and our Mini Poodle puppies are on the breed page.