Genetic Registry for Hairless Dogs

Another type of Xolo is the pila. This name is not capitalized, and it signifies a native dog found in several South American Countries, especially Peru and Argentina. Although most North Americans have never heard of pila, they are the source of the Chinese Crested and the Peruvian Inca Orchid. In 1960 when 'The Enigma of the Xoloitzcuintli' was published in Mexico, there were no Peruvian Breed names, but a chapter on pila was included. Below is Mexica, a pila dog who is quite unattractive by Xolo standards.

But look at the photo of the dog below from 'Enigma' that is almost identical to Mexica. I call this head shape the 'porpoise head'

Here is the whole litter of pila from the Enigma book (two photos)

Notice the variety of types in this litter. Although some pila have short hair or no hair at all, long hair or fluffy hair always indicates pila blood.
The dog that looks like Mexica has hair on her face, and we commonly see the same phenotype with fluffy hair, which is the true 'powderpuff' gene, a recessive hairless coat.
This means that two dogs with true powderpuff coats can have hairless pups if mated. A decade or two ago Chinese Crested had this coat all over the dog, but today they call all coated dogs by that name, if they do not understand the breed genetics and history. In pila, we usually see dogs with this gene expressed only on the head.

The following dogs are fuzzy faced pilas, Tamar and her mother Gracie.