breakfast discussion lead to question: Have you seen a horse that just had white front feet without one or both rear feet being white?

[Mango20]

In my current herd of 4, conveniently napping where I can see them right now, I have:

1. tiny coronet with earmine spots (hind) all black hooves
2. two rear socks with white hooves (black/brown in front)
3. left front and left hind socks with one white hoof and one striped.
4. pinto with two high front stockings, one rear sock. at least one ermine spot up front. Dark leg has a striped hoof, the rest are white (there may be some other stripes)

[Dr_Doolittle]

Hooves are black or white based on the skin color at the coronet band from which they originate: if a plain white sock (no ermine spots), the skin of the pastern is pink so the hoof is white. If there are ermine spots, the part of the hoof growing from the area of the pastern with dark hair (the spot) produces a dark pigmented hoof - this is why hooves with ermine spots are often striped.

I have 2 mares (mother and daughter), both have two white socks with ermine spots, and stripes on those hooves.

Sometimes ermine spots can “cluster” around the coronary band (with no pigment break and no pink skin) and produce an entirely black hoof.

But that’s what you’re seeing

And I too find color genetics fascinating!

[SuzieQNutter]

[quote=“Suz![](eQNutter,post:15,topic:454357”]

Sim has at least one front white hoof

[IMG]http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b30/SuzieQ_/Bobby/SIM/20180127_081159_zpsnjfg2txg.jpg)

Stars has ar least one white front hoof

[IMG]http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b30/SuzieQ_/20171010_072510_zps8trlznyl.jpg)

[/quote]

Okay scratch that as I actually went and looked. Stars hoof is mostly white and he has a small sock all the way around and the hair appears white all the way around but there is a large black stripe on the side of the hoof.

Sim has smaller black stripes, so his hoof appears white but when you actually look nope. The other front hoof is also striped.

[TheJenners]

@Dr. Doolittle

I read an article a few years ago with this statistic:

Hind feet/legs are more likely to have white socks/stockings, and when only one hind foot has a sock or stocking it is more often the left.

When only front feet have socks or stockings, it is also more often the left.

The “more often left” white socks has been my personal observation ;), and most horse people could tell you that white feet (legs) are more often found on hind than front - but I’m not sure whether this article included the question in the OP. Regardless, I found it interesting – and found it to be confirmation of my own experiences after looking at horses for 50+ years.

Very interesting… Esp seeing as I have two bay geldings, one ISH and one Morgan, the former with a left hind sock and blaze and the latter with a left hind anklet and barely there star :lol: Plus @Simkie’s data above shows way more hinds, face than fronts, face (21 to 4) and lefts, face has more represented than rights, face (10 to 2), so out of her small sample size of only 2007 bay mares… five to one with some number fudging for hinds only versus fronts only, and of that even, more only lefts than only rights.

[jawa]

Ages ago I read an article on the coloration of guiena pigs being determined by genetics, but also by the environment within the mother’s womb. The mother had to produce a certain chemical/hormone in order for the different coat colors to be expressed.

A few years ago, a local vet who was big into dog reproduction took an egg from a female lab, fertilized it with the sperm from a male lab and then transferred that embryo to a hound dog. The resulting puppy (named ET for embryo transfer) came out with with a dark yellow coat and 4 white socks. Neither the male or female lab had any white markings.

So…here’s a question for the genetic gurus here. Embryo transfer is a thing for some of the high end sport horses. Would the environment of the surrogate affect the outcome of the coloration of the foal?

[Dr_Doolittle]

@jawa

Ages ago I read an article on the coloration of guiena pigs being determined by genetics, but also by the environment within the mother’s womb. The mother had to produce a certain chemical/hormone in order for the different coat colors to be expressed.

A few years ago, a local vet who was big into dog reproduction took an egg from a female lab, fertilized it with the sperm from a male lab and then transferred that embryo to a hound dog. The resulting puppy (named ET for embryo transfer) came out with with a dark yellow coat and 4 white socks. Neither the male or female lab had any white markings.

So…here’s a question for the genetic gurus here. Embryo transfer is a thing for some of the high end sport horses. Would the environment of the surrogate affect the outcome of the coloration of the foal?

Wow, that’s interesting!

Another thing I’ve read is that the distribution of white markings is often affected by how the fetus is positioned in the uterus, how much sun exposure the mother had, etc. (I tried to Google this but nothing came up), while the markings themselves are largely genetic.

My mare has a half sibling with an interesting facial marking: it looks like there was supposed to be a large star on her forehead, but only the 4 corners of the star showed up as white markings - the middle was dark. Her owner named her Estrella (Spanish for star), and her marking looks like a constellation.

In the case of horses and dogs who are cloned (I guess you would call them “siblings”, but not really?), the clones all have white markings similar to the original “parent”, but distributed differently. Examples are Cruising and Sapphire - both of these horses have produced several clones that are the same color as the “original”, but whose markings are slightly different - for example, they all have blazes but the blazes are not identical.

I can’t imagine that ET horses would take on the color of the recipient mare - but that’s fascinating about the ET dog.

This has certainly morphed into an interesting discussion, if a little OT!

(I’m now looking even more closely at horses’ markings, LOL! As I mentioned in a previous post I’ve always noticed that rear legs more often have white markings/left legs more often have white markings - but figured that was anecdotal; apparently it’s actually verifiable.)

[chestnutmarebeware]

@TheJenners

Very interesting… Esp seeing as I have two bay geldings, one ISH and one Morgan, the former with a left hind sock and blaze and the latter with a left hind anklet and barely there star :lol: Plus @Simkie’s data above shows way more hinds, face than fronts, face (21 to 4) and lefts, face has more represented than rights, face (10 to 2), so out of her small sample size of only 2007 bay mares… five to one with some number fudging for hinds only versus fronts only, and of that even, more only lefts than only rights.

Both my chestnut mares, one a TB and one a breeding stock (or whatever they call it now) APHA have a single white hind leg, and they’re both on the right. The brown TB mare also has a single hind sock, but on the left. All three have white on their faces, varying from a star to a star/stripe to a full-on, nearly bald face.

I also had a gray TB mare with a single right hind stocking that passed away several years ago. So my personal count is 75% right hind whites and 25% left hind whites.

[kiwichick]

This is one of mine
the only one i recall having. 2 front stockings.