I'm still not good at this

[Stick]

My previous breeding projects tended to only involve things like dun and leopard complex, so I've learned some colorations inside and out... but now that I'm starting to get new dilution genes and other things I haven't seen for myself yet, I'm getting lost.

I only understand some elements of what's going on with these guys. Any help naming what their genetics are (and how to identify it in the future) would be a great help. I do keep reading the color guides on the site here, but helping me connect what I keep reading about with these examples that are in front of me will help me learn. Thanks!

[Silverine]

For reference as to how I label alleles:
G/g - Gray
E/e - Extension (red)
A/at/a - Agouti (bay)
Cr/prl/n - Cream/Pearl Locus
Ch/ch - Champagne
D/d - Dun
F/f - Flaxen
Pa/pa - Pangare (mealy)
R/r - Roan
S/s - Sooty
Z/z - Silver
Lp/lp - Leopard Complex
To/to - Tobiano



This guy is Sooty Buckskin Dun.
As for his genetics, we know he is bay based (E? A?) because of his red-based body with black mane/tail and legs. His body is yellowish rather than reddish, meaning he is diluted. We know the dilution is a single cream because the skin around his eyes and on his muzzle is still dark (double-pearl and cream-pearl would cause diluted skin, champagne would cause freckled skin). The sooty is visible in how his legs have darkened with age. The dun shows in his dorsal stripe and how his body is a bit 'faded' compared to his face and knees.

If you want to go even deeper, we know that he is Aa rather than just A? because his sire was black-based and could only pass an a. He also displays some light tobiano in his stockings. So overall, we can say that he is:
gg E? Aa Crn chch Dd papa rr S? zz lplp Toto

His flaxen is unknown as it would only show on chestnut.




This one is Smoky Silver Dapple with minimal tobiano markings.
Both of his parents are black-based, meaning that he can only be aa for agouti. He is very clearly not chestnut, so at least one big E with an unknown secondary. He gets the silver from his sire. It is evident in the silver colored mane/tail and very faint dapples on his body. It is also the cause of the pangare-like lightening on his legs and muzzle. The cream is the tricky part for this boy - cream doesn't affect black adult coats, but there is a very slight difference in foal coloration. Both this boy and his sire carry cream, making their foal pictures show up as somewhat blue-er in tone than if they did not have it. Silver dapple foals that do not carry cream are more reddish.

Here is a non-cream silver dapple for comparison:


Genes for your boy:
gg E? aa Crn chch dd rr Zz lplp Toto

His flaxen, pangare, and sooty are unknown as they do not affect black coats.




This boy is Mealy Silver Bay with tobiano, snowflakes, varnish, and appaloosa bronzing. The bay is indicated by the reddish body with the much darker, almost black legs. Silver is indicated by the silver colored mane, and the fact that his legs are very dark brown rather than black, even before his bronzing came into effect. (You can also see it in his feathers.) The mealy is the very faint bit of lightening where his muzzle goes from black to red, and along his underbelly. (It's much more visible in his two-year-old picture, before he really starts to varnish.)

You boy has a couple different markings going on. The first are his white forelegs, which are caused by the tobiano gene. Then he has snowflakes, varnish, and bronzing. All three are caused by the same gene, the leopard complex, though they have different effects visually. The snowflakes are the small white dots on his belly and neck. The varnish is what is causing him to appear to turn gray as he gets older. The bronzing is what is causing his lower legs to become more and more red. Once he turns four, the bronzing will stop and he will gradually start to darken again.

Here is one of my mares, displaying a ton of varnish and the darkening I'm talking about. You wouldn't know she was bay if it wasn't for her baby pictures. Your boy may end up looking somewhat like this eventually, though his varnish looks like it's progressing more slowly than hers did.




Your boy's genes:
gg Ee* A? nn chch dd Pa? rr ss Z?* Lplp Toto

*We know he has a little e because his sire was red-based. For that same reason we do not know if his sire carried silver or not, meaning that we only know for sure that he has at least one dominant Z.

(If you're curious, his mother is silver amber champagne.)




This one is just Buckskin. (Or metallic buckskin if you want to be really specific.)
Again we know he is bay based because of the red-based body with the black mane, tail, and lower legs. And again we know he is diluted because of the yellow color to his body rather than red.

His genes:
gg Ee A? Crn chch dd rr ss* zz lplp toto

*It's actually possible he does have sooty as both of his parents have it. You'll just need to keep an eye out in case he starts to darken up as he gets older.

[Stick]

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Oh goodness, thank you for such a detailed answer! This is exactly the sort of thing I'd been hoping for.

I have a couple of follow-up questions now that I have this and am trying to wrap my brain around it-- for either you or anyone else who feels like jumping in and explaining:

For that first sooty buckskin boy, first of all THANK YOU for the detail in explaining those dilutions. It really helped a lot. The only part that confused me was the mention of dun. Is he really dun? I didn't see a dorsal stripe on him, and had been thinking he was straight bay. I'm on an ancient laptop with a bad monitor, so I may be missing it.

And speaking of bad monitor, I had NO idea that the second horse had dapples! I gotta zoom in on him and get a better look, maybe when I'm on a different computer. That's so cool. I think I'm understanding Silver a little better now. The question I have for him though, is if there seems to be any difference in visible color genetics between him and his sire, aside from his sire having roan? I'd been looking at them and thinking they're pretty much phenotypically the same, but I want to make sure I'm not missing something.

Thank you for explaining some of the things about the Silver Bay. I'd done a lot with LP horses before, and so had snowflakes and varnish figured out, but the bronzing thing had still been a mystery. I'd seen people talking about it and couldn't tell if varnish and bronzing were the same thing or not, so this explanation helps a lot, and explains why his legs were weirdly paler and redder than they should have been. My question with him is, did he get the Silver from his mother?

And ah! Yes, I did want to get really specific on that fourth guy, so thank you for pointing out the metallic. I'd been wondering about that. That's definitely one of those things that I don't understand yet, either genotypically or phenotypically. So, at least I have a real-life example of it to look at now.

[Tjigra]

I was looking at that first one too, and I don't really see dun The colouring is weird for a plain sooty buckskin, but I couldn't make out any concrete characteristics of anything else.
Plus, none of his parents look dun as well. Dam is plain buckskin to my eye, and sire is roan, not dun.

[Silverine]

You're welcome.

The first boy and his mother are both displaying a very typical NAB version of dun that is so light it seems almost non-existent. The give-away for both of them is the 'washed out' appearance on their barrel coloration. On his dam, if you compare the color on her barrel to the color on her chest, foreleg, or head the color on her barrel is much less vibrant. For the son it's not as good of an idea to look at the legs because of his sooty, but if you compare his barrel to his face, his barrel is much paler, more gray-ish than the face area. My friend Pearl has a bit more experience with NAB dun than I do, so I'll ping her in case she can shed more light.

Ping.

Also, when looking for super faint dorsal stripes I find that it's easier to see if you unfocus your eyes. Like, instead of looking directly at the horses back, kind of gaze at the grass behind them. Sometimes a darker line will pop out that you didn't realize was there before. It's hard to see on your boy, but is a bit more evident on his mother.

Yeah, Pewter's dapples are so faint as to be almost non-existent - much like the dun expression on the other two. The best area to find them would be near the middle back side of his shoulder. Apart the roan, he and sire do appear to be the same. The one difference I would note is that his sire is Ee because he has a palomino parent. It's possible Pewter is Ee as well, but he could also just as easily be EE.

Varnish and bronzing are quite different. If you'd like more information on bronzing, I wrote a post about it here that should shed some light. And yes, he did get his silver from his mother. As I mentioned, she is a silver amber champagne. She has a weird mix of sooty and champagne lightening going on - the sooty is making her mane and tail darker but the champagne is still lightening her body. It's quite a pretty effect.

The metallic is a simple dominant gene, much like dun. If the horse has a copy of it, it'll be metallic. If not, it won't be. It's just that it can be hard to see, especially if the horse has training sheen.

[Stick]

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Ah, thank you for that link about bronzing!! It looks like that thread was made during my hiatus from HWO, after my time of playing around with appy genetics, so I'd never seen it before. Time to do some studying...

And dang yeah, I've never heard that about NAB expression of dun, so I do hope your friend has some input. I may have been IDing my NABS wrong for a while, if that's the case.

Also oops, I thought you'd mentioned something about a silver amber champagne dam the first time I'd read through your reply, but couldn't find it when I looked again. Sorry for asking a question you had already answered, haha.

As for metallic, is there a way to spot it aside from just kind of guessing? I don't ever really know what I'm looking for, especially when someone with the "training shinies" is thrown in.

[Silverine]

It's alright. I figured you probably just missed it.

Compare the face on your metallic boy to the face on your silver bay. You should notice really bright 'shiny' shading compared to the bay's more 'flat' ones. That's indicative of metallic. Training shine doesn't affect the face, so that's a safe place to look.

[Stick]

Compare the face on your metallic boy to the face on your silver bay. You should notice really bright 'shiny' shading compared to the bay's more 'flat' ones. That's indicative of metallic. Training shine doesn't affect the face, so that's a safe place to look.

I'll probably have to compare him to a buckskin that I know for sure isn't metallic, because buckskins kind of always look shiny to me, haha.

Also dang... this appy genetics thread is blowing my mind. This is all the stuff that I was experimenting for on this account before I took my giant hiatus. It looks like I'd missed the beginning of the big informaton-gathering party by a matter of months. It makes me want to go back through the few horses I have left from that project and all the images I'd saved to see if I'd figured out anything about the genes that the various breeds carry that isn't already covered in that thread.

[Silverine]

It's definitely been a lot of work and a lot of fun. I still have BlackOak's break-through agouti horse in my holding. We're always happy to welcome new people to the party if you want to jump in.

[Stick]

It's definitely been a lot of work and a lot of fun. I still have BlackOak's break-through agouti horse in my holding. We're always happy to welcome new people to the party if you want to jump in.

Oh man, I see that I was pinged in the second post of that thread, because I was in that very early group of experimenters! Haha, I feel bad that I never saw it now...

I'm still only at the beginning of the thread, but I haven't read anything yet about the "ribbons" of snowflakes that show up in... I forget which breed. Does that sound like something you guys have discussed? If not, I think I can trace it back and get some evidence on it, because it's still in the dregs that I have sitting around.