I was reading an article about DNA and gray horses. The “slow graying” G2 allele (which has two copies of the duplication gene variant) was found to not have an elevated risk of developing melanomas, while the “fast graying” horse was more likely to develop melanoma. It also said that a slow graying horse usually doesn’t show signs of gray until they are 5-7 years old. It also mentioned that the duplication or tripling of a small DNA sequence in gray horses determines how quickly a horse grays out. Just curious what experiences others have had regarding real life experiences with gray horses with melanomas in regards to slow-graying or fast-graying.
If interested, the article was in the Journal (AQHA publication) page 150 of the Jan-Feb 2025 edition called Gray Matters. Sorry, I can’t find a link to it!