I was just watching this video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=SxGWX_F6qG0
of the European Champion eventer, Toytown, breeding unknown, and he’s covered with white freckles, with one white patch that is composed of a bunch of white freckles together. I once rode a horse that was a really deep red chestnut covered with white freckles.
What is the technical name for white freckles on a dark horse and why do you almost always see them on chestnuts?
My GP mare was like that. She was a chestnut with 4 white socks and a blaze. At 4 little white spots started developing. By the time I lost her at 14 she was covered with white spots, some as big as a quarter. I asked a bunch of vets what it was. The best answers was random unknown spotting. Basically it’s a form of vitaligo.
She was SWB, but 3/4ths TB, and I think this is found mostly in TB’s.
The white ones are Birdcatcher spots. The black ones are Ben D’or spots.
My Quattro B mare (who is also a chestnut) gets spots that look just like that every winter and then they almost disappear in the summer just to reappear in the winter. Is that typical of those spots, anyone know ?
What laurie said - Birdcatcher spots on the chestnut. It’s really not vitiligo though.
Yes, they can indeed be seasonal, they can move around, some bigger, some smaller.
The ones my mare got started as little white hairs and grew slowly up to about the size of a quarter. They never went away. The skin underneath also turned pink. The vitaligo was what one vet at a large clinic named it. She also got spots in her mane and tail and the hair grew out white there.
Of course, my “bay” mare now has all kinds of interesting spotting. She’s a dark bay most of the year. When I clip her in the winter, she almost turns buckskin and gets bald spots. Then the bald spots start growing in with dark hair, plus other dark spots randomly. In the space of three days she went from this bizarre spotted buckskin to a dark bay a few weeks ago. Really. I have pictures.
I have had several horses with the Birdcatcher spots.
Years ago I sold a young bay horse with a biggish one on his face. The new owner totally disbelieved me and was convinced it was a scar from a rub from the bridle. A year later she rang me to appologise, the spot had faded away and several more had appeared on the neck and rump! He is 19 now and the spots seem to last only a few years before fading and reappearing elsewhere.
On the other hand, I have a chestnut broodmare with a large roany Birdcatcher spot on her butt. It has been there since the horse was 3 without moving or fading.
personally I think it maybe spotted leucotrichia, and nothig to do with bend’or spots. :)… more common in Arabians
I really like this page for colour info:
http://www.whitehorseproductions.com/tbcolor3.html
about halfway down there is a mare called Willspynow with awesome bird catcher spots… and it’s a beautiful photo by Barbara Livingston… would love a funky coloured horse like that 
[QUOTE=sfstable;6338074]
My Quattro B mare (who is also a chestnut) gets spots that look just like that every winter and then they almost disappear in the summer just to reappear in the winter. Is that typical of those spots, anyone know ?[/QUOTE]
Aren’t these sabino/racino traits?
[QUOTE=Ssporthorses;6344421]
I really like this page for colour info:
http://www.whitehorseproductions.com/tbcolor3.html
about halfway down there is a mare called Willspynow with awesome bird catcher spots… and it’s a beautiful photo by Barbara Livingston… would love a funky coloured horse like that :)[/QUOTE]
It’s not bad, pretty good in fact, but is a little outdated now. Airdrie Apache, right at the top, is still listed as Sabino, when it’s been proven he’s Dominant White
In the case you refer to, with the spots coming and going, that’s very, very typical of Birdcatcher
I know some QHs with foundation breeding in their background can have dots or spots. some can be quite large; quarter to half-dollar size.
Bend Or (dark spots, aka grease spots) and Birdcather spots come in all breeds, and are more common on red-based colors.
They’re just named after the first (presumably) horse to be known for them, aka Bend Or and Birdcatcher, 2 TBs, and also like The Tetrarch, a gray TB who had splotches develop. Tetrarch spots are just for grays though.
I think Marty Morani’s chestnut stallion Test Pilot had some kind of white speckling as well. As I recall (I only saw him in person once, and can’t find a good picture that shows the markings), they were tiny and numerous - more like ticking - very small clusters of white hair (though I don’t recall him as looking sabino at all) than anything else.
I’m watching my little dark palomino mare come up with more and more Ben d’Or spots as she ages. She had two spots when I bought her 4 years ago, one on her left cheek and one on her left hip. She now has at least 20, more on the left than on the right for some reason. And she’s starting to get dark “paint splatters” in certain places, too; she has a big splash of them down the right side of her bum.
I always wonder where markings like this come from. AFAIK, neither of her parents had them, though her sire is a very dark liver chestnut so they wouldn’t show anyway.
Interesting re Ben D’or
http://horsetalk.co.nz/2012/06/02/genetic-sleuths-unravel-historic-epsom-derby-mystery/
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