A color question

[taffydales]

I,m sure we have had this topic come up before, but can anyone tell me, if you have a black mare and I mean black not one that bays out in the summer ( I know there is a name for this ) and you put it to a non homozygous stallion, what are the possibilities, I know we have a few experts on color on here so hope someone can help.

[valerie n scout]

i think my brain has just exploded,sorry heather, thank god i didnt need to understand that,its been a really tough week xxxxx

[taffydales]

Mine too, thats a brilliant explanation Heather, but I,m still none the wiser on my original question, or am I just being stupid!!! lol.

[lucydales]

My simplistic understanding is as follows (but not guarranteed correct! LOL!):

Ignore the E/e gene as we don't have chestnuts. "G" gives grey, "A" gives bay if no "G".

A "G" gives grey (ie GG or Gg) with any A/a combination (AA or Aa or aa), it is a dominant gene.
.
An "A" gives Bay (ie AA or Aa) as long as you have gg.

Your black mare has to have no capitals(!) ie "gg aa" ie it is recessive as any capitals trump it!.

If you put her to a black stallion the foal will be black.

A bay stallion it could be bay or black.

A grey stallion it could be grey or bay or black.

If you want the probabilities I will engage brain tomorrow!

Hope that helps!

[harveydales]

Thanks Heather, found that interesting.

[taffydales]

so presumably if she is put to a colored stallion the foal could be black or colored?

[taffydales]

Got it!!!!! lol....I think, my reason for asking just incase anyone was wondering, is that I keep geting drawn back to Maggies stallion Harlequin or Harly to his friends, he is the most beautiful coloured stallion with a temperament to die for, and I can,t help thinking he would be a lovely match for Twinkle, I have seen some lovely part bred dales recently and I am very tempted.

[lucydales]

Thanks Heather, it is nice to have an "expert" view my Janet and John version!! I spent ages trying to get my head round the basic grey/bay/black last year and that was tough enough with out all the clever overlays! I found your first post really useful as I'd like a heckberry pony!

I note what you say about ignoring chestnut at my peril, but it makes it easier to understand if you do!! ;D Maybe there will be a chestnut dales some day! You need "ee" to get chestnut?

With grey your horse isn't just grey. It is bay or black with a grey overlay. If I was to breed from Drummer (he is lacking the essentials but he's a good example) I know he has a 50:50 chance of passing on grey but will always pass on black as that's his underneath colour. So, genetically he's black with a grey modifier.

Its important to always know the underlying base colour as that's what your stallion may pass on.

Have you had Drummer tested to check his underlying colour?

Right, let me check my genetic understanding! Are you then saying Drummer is Ggaa, the aa determining the black?

And if he was GgAa he would be bay underneath with a 50% chance of passing on grey (GA or Ga with 50% black {a} or 50% bay {A} underneath), 25% of passing on bay (gA) and 25% of black (ga) obviously dependant on the mares genetics??

The coloured (piebald/skewbald) stuff I will have to contemplate later!

Vanda, what are you planning to breed with what, and what colour foal do you want as a consequence? You may get an easier answer to your question in that case!!

Heather, who does colour gene testing and how much does it cost??

[lucydales]

Hell's teeth!! I think I'll stick to Janet and John!!!

"If he had been GgAa then, again yes, he'd have had 50% chance of passing grey and 50% of passing on bay. "

Why a 50% chance of passing on bay?

Options are:
GA - grey
Ga - grey
gA - bay
ga - black??

I think I've got my head round the underlying colour being black and the bay gene just restricting the black to the normal bits in a bay!

[lucydales]

Is a Dales foal/youngster colour it's underlying colour? (eg Evie's Min was a black baby and is now greying out so is a aaGg as dad was black)

So do you get bays that turn grey?? I can only think of grey Dales that were black. And can you have dapple greys that are brown rather than black base/dapples?

I bet Vanda wished she'd never asked!! Sorry for hijacking your thread Van!

[taffydales]

If you look back, hun you will see my reason for asking the original question.

[zeldalithgow]

Gosh this is complicated stuff, glad we've got brainy people on here to explain it - not sure my couple of brain cells have taken it all in though ;D thanks for all the information

[taffydales]

No problem Heather, I find it all fascinating if not a little mind boggling ,I would love to put Twinkle to a Homozygous stallion, but there is,nt one close to me that I like, its very important to me that the temperament is right for Twinks as she is such a stressy little mare, but she is also so kind and loving and I know that her problems stem from things that have happened to her in the past, not her breeding.
My understanding when I started this thread, that if I put her to Harley that there was a 50% chance of me having a colored and a 50% chance of a black foal, but being me I thought maybe it was,nt quite that simple lol.
The other problem I have with Twinks is that she has major loading and traveling issues,and I don,t want to put her through any more stress than is absolutely necessary and Harley is a mile down the road from me ;D

[taffydales]

I totaly agree Heather, as most of you will know its been a dream of mine to have a foal from Twinkle and time is not really on her side, but I just don,t want to put her to any stallion and don,t get me wrong I have some amazing stallions near by, but Harley is just the obvious choice, he has lovely confirmation a temperament to die for and seeing as my first love are my dales closely followed by coloureds, the chance of a possible part bred dales that could also be coloured seems an opportunity not to be missed.
Also Maggie is such a brilliant horse woman, she will be in great hands and just down the road for me.

[cadeby]

Vanda - you must show us a picture of the prospective suitor