Horse Colors

[Cbonadeo]

For curiosity’s sake, when you’re registering a horse/pony, how do you determine the coat color? Eyeballing it? Testing it? Vet says so? Has anyone bought a registered horse and had a coat color DNA test done to “fact check” the registered color?

(and I love cute horse photos, so feel free to post before and after color change photos if you have them! XD )

Backstory:
Several years ago, my grandmother acquired a Welsh pony named Palustrine Promise of Hope (aka Little Hope). (Some of you may remember the old 2009 thread about the Palustrine ponies going up for auction up in Michigan - Hope was the one-eyed mare in that auction). I’m not 100% sure how/who Gran got Hope from (I know she didn’t buy her at the auction, so there was at least one person between the auction and her). ANYway, Hope was registered as a Dun with the Gray gene; by the time Gran wound up with her she was a pretty flea-bitten gray.

In the past week I was (finally!) able to track down one of Hope’s previous owners (the lady who originally bought her from the breeder, pre-eye injury, pre-return to breeder, pre-auction). In addition to fulfilling my quest to get Hope’s registration transferred (yay!) I was also able to get a few ‘baby’ photos (estimated 1-2 years old). It got me thinking about her color, and I’m really curious about getting a coat color DNA test done, just to see what it says.

Baby photos:

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Photos from this Fall:

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[Scribbler]

It’s only fairly recently that color genetic testing has been available. Most registries predate that, and I don’t know how many have moved to incorporate it.

For instance, TB are rarely or never roan, but apparently at one time young grey horses would be registered as roan and/or grey because they were at the roanish stage of greying out.

Genetic testing has isolated pinto patterns that were not fully understood before and given added complexity to our understanding of appaloosa color patterns.

Someone else might know if the color breeds require genetic testing now.

[phoebetrainer]

Looking at those young photos, I would have said this horse / pony is grey. There doesn’t appear to be anything dun about her. Was she registered as dun because one of her parents was? Or was it hopeful - in that an unusual colour will sell better / get a higher price?
Dun horses usually have black / dark manes and tails - that stay dark and don’t have light hairs in them even in the juveniles - and this is certainly not the case in the young photos you have posted.

[Toblersmom]

@phoebetrainer

Looking at those young photos, I would have said this horse / pony is grey. There doesn’t appear to be anything dun about her. Was she registered as dun because one of her parents was? Or was it hopeful - in that an unusual colour will sell better / get a higher price?
Dun horses usually have black / dark manes and tails - that stay dark and don’t have light hairs in them even in the juveniles - and this is certainly not the case in the young photos you have posted.

All grey horses have an original, base color and the grey gene causes it to fade to white over time. That base color can be any color at all, black, bay, chestnut, etc, with or without any of the other modifiers like roan, Appaloosa patterns, pinto, cream or dun. You could even have a dominant white horse that has the grey gene, but you wouldn’t be able to tell by looking, and I imagine it would be awfully hard to see with a cremello or perlino. I always think graying pintos are a little sad—they have such spectacular, beautiful phases, like storm clouds chasing over the body, but it doesn’t last.

What I can’t tell from the original picture is if the horse was born dun (just to make matters more confusing, from what I understand the Connemara registry uses the term “dun” but the genetics are from the cream gene so most everybody else would use the term “buckskin”), or if the horse was a coppery sort of bay. In the days before genetic testing, one might look at the pedigree to see if there was greater clarity, but it’s something of an assumption that any horses in the pedigree prior to genetic testing were truly “dun”/buckskin rather than pale bays.

I can’t easily post pictures at the moment, but I’m really not sure what color my horse is. His BLM papers say black, but even at his darkest (freshly grown coat coming in with weeks of cloudy weather), he’s got a lot of browner hairs and he’s very, very faded and coppery in the summer. Could be bay, but his points aren’t quite as black-black as other bays at the barn, and his ear tips are not black. Might be a true brown. I think he could be a smoky black since I’ve heard those have more of a fading issue than blacks without the cream gene. Can’t analyze pedigree. Trying to decide if I care enough to do a genetic analysis.

[Cbonadeo]

@phoebetrainer

Looking at those young photos, I would have said this horse / pony is grey. There doesn’t appear to be anything dun about her. Was she registered as dun because one of her parents was? Or was it hopeful - in that an unusual colour will sell better / get a higher price?
Dun horses usually have black / dark manes and tails - that stay dark and don’t have light hairs in them even in the juveniles - and this is certainly not the case in the young photos you have posted.

From what I’ve read, gray isn’t a base coat color, so a horse shouldn’t actually be registered as a gray. The WPCSA registers them as the base coat color, with an additional box (yes/no) for whether they have the gray gene. These photos are from 1-2 years old, so I have no way of knowing what she really looked like when she was born and registered. Presumably her mane and tail were dark and body was solid color (but with dorsal stripe and leg barring I guess?) with minimal gray hairs. The angle of the photos prevents me from seeing her dorsal line, and she had a liver cream sibling and a chestnut sibling (and 3 dun siblings) so I’m just curious.

https://www.vgl.ucdavis.edu/services/horse/gray.php
http://www.animalgenetics.us/Equine/Coat_Color/Gray.asp

[Pony_Fixer]

My very not black horse is registered as a black color on his papers. Like another poster above he has brown hairs on his muzzle/face, and depending on time of year on his upper legs, etc. He fades into a “bay” but his points are super dark brown, not truly black. I call his mane/tail “black” but they could be super dark brown. So now I call him a bay because that’s just easy–in reality he’s likely a brown or one of those fancy colors like smoky black as well.

[2DogsFarm]

My $.02, since I have never registered anything I’ve owned:
I go by obvious color.
Bay has black points/mane/tail on brown(blood, mahogany & in-between) coat
Gray is anything from dark & dappled to flea-bitten.
Chestnut… well DUH! < ranging from copperpenny bright to liver.

Vet gave me a conniption when he labeled my mini as grulla on the Coggins I needed for an ADS show.
Here’s the mini:

https://imgur.com/a/FgKFXdC

Up close, mini has some roaning, but otherwise I’d call him black bay.
No dun stripe, no leg striping.
WTG(rulla)F?

[Arelle]

I do color testing on all of mine; but I’m also breeding paints so I need to know which are carrying the frame gene. :lol:

There’s a big “to do” on one of the stock horse FB groups right now about the difference in sorrel and chestnut. Lots of arguing and people posting their own photos.

I think it’s all very interesting, and relatively cheap (at least… compared to all the things we spend money on for horses, LOL).

When registering a foal, unless it’s really obvious, I’ve tested. I have to do DNA anyway when breeding using AI so might as well throw a color panel on the kit, especially for fillies. I had a filly born last year who was SUPER light around the eyes and muzzle - mom was a palomino so I was hoping so hard for the cream gene. Nope - red as can be. (Side note - she did end up being flaxen, which is a gene that hasn’t been identified.)

I’ve also submitted my rabicano mare to the UF testing pool and I’m hoping to hear news of that in 2019. Here’s hoping they can isolate that gene!

Here’s a “baby” photo of the filly I tested for the cream gene (and her palomino mother): [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“center”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“17855449_10101529143885379_273673373641953522_o.jpg”,“data-attachmentid”:10286767}[/ATTACH]

And then, her Christmas photo this year as a yearling: [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“center”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“GinnyChristmas.JPG”,“data-attachmentid”:10286768}[/ATTACH]

[Scribbler]

Lovely chestnut Paint filly! Is her mom really palomino or dies she just have white mane and tail from her pinto pattern? That belly spot looks very chestnut.

I’ve dabbled with the idea of breeding my chestnut Paint mare to a buckskin stallion I know and hoping for palomino spots

As far as chestnut versus sorrel, its a regional difference based on whether horse lingo in your area is influenced more by English or Spanish terms. I understand sorrel to refer to a red chestnut. These kinds of terms can also have very local or even idiosyncratic meanings and people get very up in arms about definitions as they understand them.

[Arelle]

@Scribbler

Lovely chestnut Paint filly! Is her mom really palomino or dies she just have white mane and tail from her pinto pattern? That belly spot looks very chestnut.

I’ve dabbled with the idea of breeding my chestnut Paint mare to a buckskin stallion I know and hoping for palomino spots

As far as chestnut versus sorrel, its a regional difference based on whether horse lingo in your area is influenced more by English or Spanish terms. I understand sorrel to refer to a red chestnut. These kinds of terms can also have very local or even idiosyncratic meanings and people get very up in arms about definitions as they understand them.

She’s palomino but looks very sorrel; hence the color testing. Mom does carry the cream gene, but is a very dark palomino. She was actually in the September/October Paint Horse Journal in an article about interpreting color testing results as she also carries both the LWO and Tobiano gene.
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Edit to Add: It is funny how defensive people get about sorrel/chestnut. There have been arguments about regional dialect, breed differences, whether it’s an english or western horse, etc.

Personally, I call anything on the dark side (liver chestnut, or more of a mahogany red with a mane and tail darker than their body) chestnut and then anything that is lighter sorrel.

This is my current crew - I’d consider the 2nd (and possibly 3rd) from left chestnut. Actually had someone online insist she was bay and I was an idiot. :lol: The rest are sorrel. I like to consider myself something of an expert on red horses.
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[Edre]

My first horse was a JC registered TB, and “dk brown” on his papers IIRC. He was about as bay as you can get - black mane and tail, black legs. Very unambiguous but somehow he got a more creative title than bay.

My current horse is a bit of a mystery child. Born dark (black) but with a bit of mouseyness that indicated she might actually be black (advertised as black) but has a killer dark brown coat in summer. Bleaching or real color? Who knows. Winter has brought black back. Out of curiosity I sent hair off for testing. Hoping to get results today or tomorrow. I suspect she’s brown (chestnut dam, bay sire, but with black horses everywhere in her pedigree within a few generations so not impossible) but we’ll see.

I’ll report back once the results come in… two of the things in the panel have been completed with results but not the color. I’m dying. :lol:

Edit: had a photo of the TB papers. “Dark bay or brown”. Which is still much more interesting than the lovely dirt color he was at maturation.

[ParadoxFarm]

What great pictures, Arelle!!

Okay, I have a 7-year-old TB who is bay in color, but has white hairs all over. From far, you cannot see them. And so if TBs don’t roan, what’s going on? They don’t change. But they’re definitely all over. I’d have to take a closeup to show the white hairs everywhere.

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[chestnutmarebeware]

@Edre

My first horse was a JC registered TB, and “dk brown” on his papers IIRC. He was about as bay as you can get - black mane and tail, black legs. Very unambiguous but somehow he got a more creative title than bay.

Doesn’t the Jockey Club link dark bay and brown as a single option for their registration purposes? One of mine is listed that way (the one in my profile picture), as DK BAY/BROWN. But she’s almost 17 so they may have changed the color choices in recent years.

[Scribbler]

As far as bay and black, genetically a bay horse is black plus a modifying gene (“agouti”). So a bay sire and a black foal makes perfect sense.

According to the color geneticists, there are only two base colors, black and chestnut. Everything else is additional modifications of those two colors. All bays are modified black, even the bright bays that are brighter than some chestnuts. Buckskin is bay plus creme.

[Arelle]

@ParadoxFarm

What great pictures, Arelle!!

Okay, I have a 7-year-old TB who is bay in color, but has white hairs all over. From far, you cannot see them. And so if TBs don’t roan, what’s going on? They don’t change. But they’re definitely all over. I’d have to take a closeup to show the white hairs everywhere.

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Thanks!

Could just be a weird gene. My sorrel horse has the same thing - little white hairs all over, but not enough to be called roan or rabicano. He also has quite a bit of grey in his tail - but he isn’t grey, nor does he have a grey parent. Just kind of an odd color if you really get up and start inspecting him. You can’t see all the white hairs from across the pen, but you can when you’re up around him. He also has the same thing as my rabicano mare where his sorrel gets darker the farther you go down his legs (see his hock color vs his neck/shoulder): [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“center”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“31957912_10101955533916339_5764061598331174912_n.jpg”,“data-attachmentid”:10286946}[/ATTACH]

My chestnut mare is rabicano - which features white at the tail head and white “roaning” throughout (photo below) - but your guy doesn’t appear to have typical rabicano features. [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“center”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“180736_673043568319_5050797_n.jpg”,“data-attachmentid”:10286944}[/ATTACH]

A friend of mine has an APHA stallion who DOES have an unidentified white gene. (As well as frame AND splash.) It produces more of a varnish look, in my eyes, but no one knows what causes it. He is NOT roan. [ATTACH=JSON]{“data-align”:“center”,“data-size”:“full”,“title”:“23231156_10159637325030551_2840246238740088797_n.jpg”,“data-attachmentid”:10286945}[/ATTACH]

[ParadoxFarm]

Interesting Arelle. Thanks. And your horse has the SWEETEST face. Is he sweet?

[Highflyer]

@MsM

I had an odd kind of chestnut. Often mistaken for bay at first glance, but didn’t have black points and the mane and tail were multi-colored.

This is what I would consider a liver chestnut.

[MsM]

Yep, he was, but a much redder version than most. And the mostly black mane and tail fooled many. Actually my next horse was a liver chestnut that really was a liver-y color!

[Edre]

@Scribbler

As far as bay and black, genetically a bay horse is black plus a modifying gene (“agouti”). So a bay sire and a black foal makes perfect sense.

According to the color geneticists, there are only two base colors, black and chestnut. Everything else is additional modifications of those two colors. All bays are modified black, even the bright bays that are brighter than some chestnuts. Buckskin is bay plus creme.

Yep! Although from my understanding, agouti is dominant so a horse only needs one copy of it to end up presenting as bay, rather than black - black requires two copies of a recessive? My understanding of this is fairly rudimentary though, so I could be wrong. Waiting on tests to come back (humbug). Red factor & agouti both pending. Patience is not my strong suit.

[furlong47]

@ParadoxFarm

What great pictures, Arelle!!

Okay, I have a 7-year-old TB who is bay in color, but has white hairs all over. From far, you cannot see them. And so if TBs don’t roan, what’s going on? They don’t change. But they’re definitely all over. I’d have to take a closeup to show the white hairs everywhere.

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TBs can have roaning caused by other genes such as rabicano. What they cannot be is a true roan - mixed 50% white and dark hair over the entire body except head and legs. The roan gene does not exist in TBs except for one line (Catch a Bird) in Australia where it was a mutation. Catch a Bird himself was a mutation - a brindle (possibly a chimera) and a few of his offspring are the only true roan TBs.