Horse colors

PasoBaby_CarolU · Horse colors

There are several sites on horse colors that are worth reading. Even if you're not a breeder or looking for a specific color, sometimes it's nice to know what color your horse is.

http://www.horsecolor.com/

http://www.ultimatehorsesite.com/colors/index.html

http://www.whitehorseproductions.com/equinecolor.html

And probably one of the better explanation pages, if not big on pictures is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equine_coat_color_genetics

ElaineC

Very interesting reads. The other weekend, I was at a horse show and there was a gelding that looked like a buckskin, except his points were dark brown instead of black. I'm still not sure I'd call him a buckskin, I'd always figured they had to have black points.

What would you call a buckskin-like horse, with dark brown legs, muzzle, ear tips, mane and tail? It was definately brown points, not bleached out black. He did have something of a dorsal stripe too, but he didn't look anything like a dun in any other way.

ElaineC

Nm, I actually read through the sites, and it turns out he's an "amber champagne". Learn 2 read, I know, I know LOL

calatar

Hmm, grulla would probably be more likely based on that description. He has to have the dun gene for that dorsal stripe.

PasoBaby_CarolU

A dorsal stripe has to be distinct and go into the tail head to be considered a dun marking. Otherwise it is called "countershading," and you'll see a lot of bays, browns, and buckskins with a darker hair color "stripe" down their back. With a dun it is distinctly a different color.

Just to add to the mix, you can also get frosting in the mane and tail from a recessive gene...so you'll have a buckskin - or dun - with black, brown and white/grey in the mane and tail.

Rosie has red, black and white hairs in her mane and tail.

Playenatural

http://www.duncentralstation.com/
This site was linked to the pages Carol put up. Lots of good pictures and explanation of why a dorsal stripe doesn't always mean dun.

ElaineC

The horse really didn't look like a dun, the dorsal stripe looked like countershading. We have a lovely red dun on the farm, with a really distinct mask and striping on his legs, this horse had none of that. A friend of mine has a very sharp buckskin with frosting in his mane and tail, she doesn't like it but I do!

calatar

So correct me if I am wrong but based on those sites it seems that true dorsal stripe does mean dun. I understand that countershading can look like a dorsal and in those cases the horse is not a dun.

Playenatural

Look on the link I posted and look at "Look alike colors". Other colors can have a dorsal stripe. It was the presence of countershading that differentiated it from the sharp stripe of a dun.

My bay pinto gelding was born with one that disappeared.

Some of the pictured horses even had shadow stripes on their legs.

The ear tips seem to be one of the clearest indicators.

It really depends on if the dilute is from dun, cream, champaign or a combination.

calatar

PasoBaby_CarolU

Duns also have other primitive markings, rings around ears, color tipped ears, cross across withers, zebra stripes on legs. Many have LOTS of whirls all over.

I would say the horse Elaine described is a buckskin.

If you cross a dun with a pinto and get a dun pinto foal, you will have breaks in the dorsal stripe where you have white spots. It doesn't change the genetics of the horse. White really isn't another color, it is an absence of color.

Since UC Davis developed a DNA test for dun, they are learning a lot more about the color.

Playenatural

Pedestal*Pony

How interesting! Very neat post Carol! Thank you for posting it! I THINK I have a red dun mustang mare.

I will take some pictures and let you all help figure it out. I hope I do but I guess ya never know.

She has the dorsal stripe and light leg stripes. Hmmmmm ....

EcstaticLady

This is one of those topics that makes me glad I have a "boring" bay!

Although she's so faded she's going to end up looking more like a buckskin or maybe an amber champagne or. . .

Dawn & Lady

jokersmama

I love horse color! It's so interesting!

I have a dun that has all the bells and whistles dorsal stripe, ear bars, shoulder bars, leg bars. He even had the mask on his face and shadow marks on his neck. BUT he is greying! Soon he will have no markings and be completely white with a black mane and tail !! He also has the sooty gene that makes them appear to have dapples but it's just the coloring.

As a 2 yr old his markings were almost black.
You can see in his tail where the greying has started.

This year

I have been fighting with AQHA for years over his color. I listed "dun" as his color and they said it was genetically impossible with his sire and dams colors. Well years ago in AQHA you could have what they called a line back buckskin which is what the sire was listed as, it says right on his papers "buckskin" then under markings it says "dorsal stripe, leg bars"...?? They are crazy I think!

Unlike some other registries they aren't able to register the color they foaled they only have the option of listing as grey. AHA you can register "Grey foaled dun".
At the time of his registration I didn't know he was going to grey his sire throws 50% grey.

I have another foal from the same sire that foaled out bay turned black, bleaches out in the sun, and is now greying. It's so interesting that it starts at the tip of their nose and the tip of their tail and meets in the middle. The middle of Spanky's tail is silver!

Horse color fascinates me!

Look at this color!

http://www.equiworld.net/uk/horsecare/Breeds/brindle/index.htm

And here is a fun color calculator

http://www.animalgenetics.us/CCalculator1.asp

peachpie

Deuce is a zebra dun. This shows the bi-color mane and some of the leg barring. I read some of the three sites and it made for an enjoyable evening. Thanks for posting about color.

jokersmama

I took this with my phone about 3 years ago at an auction. TB with a really unique coloring pattern.

I can't find my horse color book right now but I believe it is called marbling.

From what I remember it happens gradually starting with one little crack in the coloring and spreading from there.

Found a quote somewhere else from the book:

PasoBaby_CarolU

We call that lacing. It is not uncommon at all.

http://www.theequinest.com/horse-...nexplained-markings-and-patterns/

It can be caused by rain scald. It also can be inherited apparently associated with pinto and appy coloring.

jokersmama

COOL! Whatever it is I like it! I like trying to make pictures out of it. (insert nerd smiley)

Clarissa

This is absolutely amazing!! I have just discovered something about my best mare I never knew (but was told about when I bought her!)

When I went to look at a chestnut QHxarab mare for sale in 1985, one of the things they said was she was 'catbacked'. I had no idea what they were talking about & didn't want to let on! I thought it refered to her conformation but to me she looked very good for an over-used QH. So I ignored them & purchased the mare who'se name was ChaCha. Or as I was later to learn I had purchased ChaCha's mother Quarter ChaCha!! This mare was 6yrs older than I thought! It turns out she was one of the first QH's in Aust to win a ROM. Their brands were so similar the dam had been slipped in for the daughter!

I haven't heard the saying 'cat-backed' since.

Anyway the people selling her were using her as a broodmare for their arab stallions because she had some interesting colour. She was chestnut but with a flaxen mane & tail & had produced palamino foals. Maybe they were trying for something more exotic.

She had queensland itch which I cleared up but she always had a pattern of white marks along her back which I put down to the scaring from the itch! Some of her foals by my stallions had indistinct white patterns along their backs too. It looked a bit like the outline of dapples. None were anywhere near as pronounced as those in the photos in that article in the link in previous post put up by Paso.

Jude my QH mare out of ChaCha has very indistinct white flecks which I just thought were insect bites or something coincidentally forming a pattern like dapples.

Now I know better. I will keep an eye out & take a photo when I next see them. They are more easily seen when she gets a nice new coat when shes in very good condition. She is heavily dappled when in really good condition. I know dapples are much more prominent when the horse is in really good to fat condition & I read it was from their hides being a bit over heated from being fat.

Or rather that the dapple look in the hair forms around hot patches that change the way the hair folicle acts. So it stands up a little giving the appearance of rings of different colour.

Cat backed hey? who'd have ever thunk it? She was even more special than I knew!!

I had her until her death year before last!

Julie

Most of our highland ponies are duns of some type, one of mine also has tiger stripes on his legs!

cynthia peterson

The Brindle Horse is very interesting. The Quarter Horse Reg. did a thing on that a couple years or so ago. Someone turned in a DNA test to reg. a Wild Brindle stallion colt. The test showed it was a filly!. How odd? So they did a big test on some Brindle horses and published the report in the QH Journal. It seems the color was because the twin died (other sex) and somehow the color coats got mixed!

I have a QH mare who keeps getting more and more white hair flecks all over the body with a mane and tail going grey. She also keeps getting many very small white specks. She is 12 ans I have had her for 8 years. I have bred greys over the years. This is not a grey horse.

Last year I was asked to come over to a breeder to try to guess a Buckskin stallion's foal's color. It was a odd dull black color. They were going to go with "brown" on the papers. It turned out (after I googled around) it was a rare "black, smokey buckskin. It was like the dabbles were reversed. It was still not a pretty color....

jokersmama

Wasn't it that same study that revealed the horse had two completely different sets of DNA?

cynthia peterson

Yep, that was it...

PasoBaby_CarolU

Cyndy, we see that a lot in Paso Finos, a smutty gene.

I recently went to evaluate a Paint for a woman in central Utah. The Paint only had two color spots - it's ears. All the rest was white. I really didn't care for it at all - and had a hard time looking past the color (or lack of) to see the horse itself.