Color Genetics

Equine Color Genetics 101

Many years ago, when one of my customers (Deea Hoover) brought her dun/roan mare (had both a roan & dun gene) to Tender. One of the questions she asked was… What color of a foal could she get with this cross?

As foolish as I felt, I had to admit to her. I really didn’t know. To this day, I am thankful to Deea and her question because it started “a need to know” the answer to her (and other customer’s) questions about color genetics and breeding for color. What started as a simple question has lead to over 9 years of learning, questioning and research about color genetics. And keeping statistics on what Nu Star Tender produced with the different mare color which came to him for breeding.

As you read this web page, I am not going to touch base on some of the color topics, however; for a more in depth view. I will provide links to different web sites which will go into more detail on any given subject.

For the subject matter at hand, this web page will deal with basic color, the cream gene, smutting/countershading gene. I am not going to pretend that I know all there is about this subject, however; my specialty is breeding for smutty buckskins.

There are four known dilute genes which are the Champagne, Cream, Dun and Taffy gene. Diluting genes are an incomplete dominant gene which is apparent on the recipient depending on its base color. Two diluting genes which can change an equine coat color to the point of it being mistaken for a different color is the Cream and Taffy gene. Do to the fact, I feel that there is so much information out there about the Dun, Champagne and Taffy genes and it isn’t something I breed for (even though I own duns), I will not be talking about it but each gene can be researched in the links provided on this page.