# Roan to Grey?



## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

I have two grey horses right now in my string that are both almost pure white in summer. Both are registered AQHA, both were born roan, or at least that is what their papers say. One was a blue roan and the other a red roan. Now they are both white or mud colored depending on how wet and muddy their pasture is. I really don't want another grey/white horse they seem to be prone to having melanomas as they get older and I don't love the color although it is helpful during elk season as nobody mistakes a white horse for an elk on accident. Anyway I am looking at various horses in the upcoming Salmon sale and this one looks like one I want to take a closer look at, when I am at the sale but how do I tell if he is going to grey out or not? or is that even possible? He is an 11 year old grade QH: 




Horse color and genetics and knowing what gives what is something I am really not good at so any thoughts or pointers on how to actually tell if a horse will grey out or not would be appreciated.


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## 3Horses2DogsandaCat (Apr 19, 2016)

An eleven-year-old should already be grey if it has the grey gene. Some horses take longer to grey than others, but I've never heard of any not turning grey by age 7.


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## LoriF (Apr 3, 2015)

Even with not knowing what color his parents are, at 11, I would say the chances of greying out are almost none if at all. Roans don't grey out unless they have the grey gene but that would be any color with the grey gene. Nice horse, I like him.


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## trailhorserider (Oct 13, 2009)

His head is dark so he's a roan. If he were gray, his head would be white.

It's interesting that the people that bred your other horses couldn't tell grey from roan. :shock: I understand the moment they are born it can be hard to tell, but golly, if they take the trouble to register a horse, they could at least get their color right. It takes at least one grey parent to make a grey, and I believe roan is the same way. So unless they are breeding grey + roan, I don't see how breeders could mess that up. It's one part how they look and one part what is genetically possible. And one part color testing if they are still not sure. 

But anyway, the one you posted video of is roan.


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## trailhorserider (Oct 13, 2009)

PS. I just watched the video. I like that horse a lot. Very nice horse! The only thing I found interesting is that he almost seemed to speed trot him into a canter. I thought horses trained to a higher level (than I am used to anyway) would have a separate cue for the canter......not just trot him so fast he breaks into a canter. Does anyone have any thoughts on that? I saw that twice in the video so I don't think it's an accident. It made it look like the horse was reluctant to canter. And then I thought, maybe that's just how they taught him to canter? That or the horse was reluctant to canter?

Anyway, I'm not an expert at anything, and I spend my life at the bottom end of the horse market so what do I know. I'm sure that lovely horse is more than I could afford! But I just thought I would mention it for discussion's sake because that was something I noticed.

Also, any horse that neck reins nicely could theoretically be ridden bridle-less. Especially in an arena doing things he's been drilled on. So while that's nice, I don't think it means much. More of a party trick to try to impress people.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

The speed trot to canter instead of distinct queues was was something I noticed as well. I couldn't tell if he was asking for the canter and the horse needed to speed trot to hit it, or if he just sped up the trot until it broke into a canter and he never asked for the canter, or if the horse is learning that transition and he is asking for the canter and just speeding up the trot until the horse breaks over into the canter and then releasing the queue to teach the horse how to canter on command, essentially using the bigger trot as a pre-queue that will eventually be dropped.

The horse isn't being evented at the sale so if I like his conformation I will ride him and see what I think. I think this horse has a couple of holes, that may well be one of them. 

I talked to the seller and he isn't competing on this horse, he said it is because he wants to win the competitions part and he has another horse that is better trained that he will be competing on and he doesn't want to have to juggle the two. To me it sounds like the horse has more holes than he wants to admit as there are other people in the sale that are competing on as many as six different horses they have consigned. 

You'll also notice that this horse never relaxes during the rides, its head is always up and it is slightly concerned about everything it is doing, not badly but for an eleven year old it is more concern than I would like to see in simple tasks. 

He bumps to a stop instead of a smooth transition so he isn't really dropping his rear end much/enough for the gait he is in, it makes for a stop that will pitch you forward in the saddle if you aren't ready for it. 

There are some other things I noticed and I made notes on but I will be looking at all those things in depth on Friday. I can live with some holes others I can't so the evaluation Friday when I can actually be on the horse in person will tell me if I want to bid on him or not on Saturday.


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## trailhorserider (Oct 13, 2009)

Tell us how it goes.......and if you come home with a horse! :biggrin:


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## lb27312 (Aug 25, 2018)

I really like that horse! I really really don't think it will grey, like someone else said I really can't believe the registration papers weren't correct. 

I had a friend that got a tri-colored paint as a baby off of a nurse mare..... she was grey by 4..... but you can still see where the paint is


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## lb27312 (Aug 25, 2018)

AndyTheCornbread said:


> I talked to the seller and he isn't competing on this horse, he said it is because he wants to win the competitions part and he has another horse that is better trained that he will be competing on and he doesn't want to have to juggle the two. To me it sounds like the horse has more holes than he wants to admit as there are other people in the sale that are competing on as many as six different horses they have consigned. It could be he has young kids and maybe not have the money to enter more than one horse?
> 
> You'll also notice that this horse never relaxes during the rides, its head is always up and it is slightly concerned about everything it is doing, not badly but for an eleven year old it is more concern than I would like to see in simple tasks. - Seems that maybe bothered by the spurs? But my horses don't always have a lowered head especially working around their buddies.....
> 
> ...


I wish you the best of luck either way!


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

@lb27312

It doesn't cost to enter the events as far as I know they are purely for demoing the horses for buyers, and given what these horses bring at this auction even if there was it would be a drop in the bucket compared to what they will get with a horse that shows well. Usually if they aren't showing a horse at this auction it is because the horse does things they don't want on display to potential buyers.

It isn't that I am looking for a lowered head especially artificially it is that I am looking for relaxation through the poll so that you know the horse is 100% OK with what he is doing, not carrying any rabbits so to speak. That horse looks like he carries 1 - 2 rabbits through the entire thing, and yes it could be worry about the spurs. But like I said for an 11 year old carrying a small amount of worry through simple circles isn't a plus for them on my "should I drop that kind of money on a horse". Even grade horses at this auction can go for $15,000+ depending on what they can do.

Worry is something that is usually fairly easy to teach a horse to get rid of and then they naturally relax through their poll. It doesn't always mean a lowered head but as they relax and do their thing it generally does. Even if there are other horses near by the horse should be checking in with me, then looking at his destination then to me then his destination ..etc. Not checking in with his buddies, his mind should be with me.

I will still be taking a hard look at this horse and several other because just because it has a few holes doesn't mean it isn't something I can't change and I don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater.


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## jaydee (May 10, 2012)

I would say that the horse in the video is almost certainly a roan and won't lighten, although they can look lighter in the winter.
Its a nice looking horse and moves well but the nice head carriage you see in the bridled work disappears in the bitless work which says to me that the 'frame' is down to the leverage bit and not self carriage.
I'm not impressed by stuff like standing on a horse (my old Irish Draught mare will put up with all of that but she'll still buck you off or try to spook and spin if she thinks she can get away with it!) Same with the pulling a buggy around - being desensitized to stuff doesn't necessarily = quiet/reliable to ride.
The running into canter would put me off if I was looking for a well schooled horse - an 11 year old with some mileage under its saddle should be beyond that stage now.
I wonder how green he really is?
Doping horses for sales videos is nothing new, always keep that in mind.


I'm not against buying from auctions - I used to do it all the time - but its so easy to get duped'
I bought three of the horses I have now from auctions but I'd already looked at one of them and knew the seller was genuine. The other two came from UK auctions that are warranted so the horse has to be 'as described on the catalogue' and you can get a vetting on site and return the horse after the trial period is up if it proves to not be what it was supposed to be.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

@jaydee that's pretty much exactly what I thought too about his collection and carriage. This auction is a vetted auction where the horses have to be tested prior to the events by an on site vet so drugging the horse isn't something that generally happens at the auction but I imagine it has happened in the sale videos before and probably will be again. The sellers have to pay a co-op membership fee to be able to consign horses to this auction and if there is any hinkiness with any of their sales ever they are no longer allowed to sell at this auction as their membership gets revoked. That is why I will only buy from sellers who have two years or more of belonging to this auction. If the horses aren't as described the seller loses a tremendous amount in revenue by no longer being able to sell at this auction anymore. It keeps sellers bringing their best horses to this auction over the years. This horses owner has been selling at this auction for 9 years but I have noticed in past years he only competes on his better horses. 

Like you I am unimpressed by stuff like standing on a horse etc. I had a bad bucker once that would stand still for anything and not spook at all but put him on a steep downhill grade and tell him he had to walk down vs run and he would buck so hard he would make your nose bleed.

The running into canter and his inability to self collect and relax is why I want to ride this horse right after the vet check so I know he isn't drugged. I am thinking he was either started late and is essentially a five or six year old in an eleven year old's body or he was started and then just not worked with much until lately. Stuff like that I am going to need to get on him and ride him to be able to figure out and then I have to decide if the holes are something I can live with and or fix myself. Right now I am leaning toward no on this guy but I won't know for sure until I ride him.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

I think the general consensus is that the horse will remain roan, which is a color I don't love to begin with but I like it better than grey. I don't buy horses for color I buy them for function but I figure if I am going to be looking at a horse for another 10 - 15 years I should at least hope for a color I enjoy looking at. e.g. my 22 year old is a dappled smoke/coal buckskin. I love his color.

Anyway it's off topic but this is another horse at the auction that is 14 years old that these people have been trying to sell since 2015. I personally think the horse never sells because they either want too much for it and are no-sale-ing the horse or buyers aren't bidding because it has really heavy Hancock breeding and nobody wants to deal with the issues that a lot of Hancock horses seem predisposed to, myself included. I have had one Hancock bred horse in the past and it was a mare and I won't own another one. I had a friend that took her out and full on ran her for five miles straight and she never broke a stride. They have unreal amounts of endurance but they are hard headed and prone to bucking fits and if a horse can gallop for that long without breaking a stride imagine how long they can buck for if they decide to. Anyway here is his video, see if anything stands out to you that might give further reasons why they haven't been able to sell this horse after trying for four years:


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## lb27312 (Aug 25, 2018)

That seems like a nice horse... it sounds like a really high end Auction where around here it's usually bottom of the barrel. On the above horse I would personally pass if it was heavily Hancock bred.... I know there are good ones out there but... I didn't like the first part of the video but liked to see him working with the cows and branding. Is there a way to find out the reserve on him? 4 years and not having sold him is a little strange. 

I can't wait to hear about your journey there and if you get anything.


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## Cedar & Salty (Jul 6, 2018)

My advice is to try for the plainest RMO horse that comes up latest in the catalogue, but I'm biased!

I only half joke that my (non RMO) grade QH Salty is 1/4 Arab and 3/4 Hancock QH. He could get a part time job bucking out of the chutes in Vegas in December!

Good luck on Saturday!


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## phantomhorse13 (Feb 18, 2011)

AndyTheCornbread said:


> Anyway here is his video, see if anything stands out to you that might give further reasons why they haven't been able to sell this horse after trying for four years


Could the horse be cold-backed? I always wonder when sale videos show things like picking up of feet and bridling but do NOT show saddling..


He seems like a nice enough working horse otherwise (I know nothing about working cattle so can't comment much beyond that).


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## Yogiwick (Sep 30, 2013)

The black looks almost lame behind. Didn't show much movement in the video, cow works (great but can't see the horse move) and lots of still (which show horse is shiny! yay!). The rider is also busy and hard to see the horse, maybe I was looking for an issue but not impressed. Seems like a nice horse that knows his job but wasn't impressed otherwise.


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## COWCHICK77 (Jun 21, 2010)

AndyTheCornbread said:


> I think the general consensus is that the horse will remain roan, which is a color I don't love to begin with but I like it better than grey. I don't buy horses for color I buy them for function but I figure if I am going to be looking at a horse for another 10 - 15 years I should at least hope for a color I enjoy looking at. e.g. my 22 year old is a dappled smoke/coal buckskin. I love his color.
> 
> Anyway it's off topic but this is another horse at the auction that is 14 years old that these people have been trying to sell since 2015. I personally think the horse never sells because they either want too much for it and are no-sale-ing the horse or buyers aren't bidding because it has really heavy Hancock breeding and nobody wants to deal with the issues that a lot of Hancock horses seem predisposed to, myself included. I have had one Hancock bred horse in the past and it was a mare and I won't own another one. I had a friend that took her out and full on ran her for five miles straight and she never broke a stride. They have unreal amounts of endurance but they are hard headed and prone to bucking fits and if a horse can gallop for that long without breaking a stride imagine how long they can buck for if they decide to. Anyway here is his video, see if anything stands out to you that might give further reasons why they haven't been able to sell this horse after trying for four years:


I have no idea what they are asking for the horse in the video but if you were considering buying him I'd have him vetted.
He looks short behind and watching him hold a calf after setting ropes he don't really want to, he gets strung out and hollow. He's very flat and short strided.
Other than roping calves it didn't show him doing a whole lot I was impressed with that would call for a big price tag.


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## SueC (Feb 22, 2014)

3Horses2DogsandaCat said:


> An eleven-year-old should already be grey if it has the grey gene. Some horses take longer to grey than others, but I've never heard of any not turning grey by age 7.


 A heterozygous grey, like my Arabian mare was, isn't necessarily grey by age 7. Mine certainly wasn't. Here's her colours at different ages.

My eventually fleabitten grey mare at birth:










18 months:










Age 2:









Age four and a half:










At age six:



















At age 10, finally grey for the first time - but still had a near-black mane and tail, and black legs:










At age 27, the year before she retired from riding:










Before she was 10, in that intermediate stage, there were a few years people who met her for the first time thought she was roan. She had two full siblings who greyed out the same way as her, in the same time scale too. The sire was homozygous grey, the dam was a bay.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

@COWCHICK77 I wasn't impressed with him at all in person and the people selling him gave me a really bad "used horse trader" vibe. I looked into their past sales and they specialize in selling registered cow horses to people with more money than common sense, and their bloodlines run really Hancock heavy. After meeting them in person you couldn't pay me to buy a horse from them. This one went for $6,750 which I felt was high given what he really is, but the guy is a hard core horse trader and he talks a good game to people who don't know any better.

I ended up buying two horses. The one that took second in the ranch horse competition and another one that ridden by a little girl blew the socks off the adults in the trail competition. I have ridden them both in the last week and am really happy with my choices. Both are AQHA, and the one that did well in the ranch horse competition has amazing breeding, the one that did well in the trail has decent breeding, not as great as the other one but still very good.


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## COWCHICK77 (Jun 21, 2010)

AndyTheCornbread said:


> @COWCHICK77 I wasn't impressed with him at all in person and the people selling him gave me a really bad "used horse trader" vibe. I looked into their past sales and they specialize in selling registered cow horses to people with more money than common sense, and their bloodlines run really Hancock heavy. After meeting them in person you couldn't pay me to buy a horse from them. This one went for $6,750 which I felt was high given what he really is, but the guy is a hard core horse trader and he talks a good game to people who don't know any better.
> 
> I ended up buying two horses. The one that took second in the ranch horse competition and another one that is ridden by a little girl blew the socks off the adults in the trail competition. I have ridden them both in the last week and am really happy with my choices. Both are AQHA, and the one that did well in the ranch horse competition has amazing breeding, the one that did well in the trail has decent breeding, not as great as the other one but still very good.


Sounds like you made a good choice! 
I'm not a fan of Hancocks either. People who are, say, "well you've never ridden a good one". 
You're right, I haven't. Haha!


Congrats on your new purchases!


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

The roan originally talked about on this thread also suffered from "_horse trader seller_" syndrome. Now that fella wasn't nearly as good at selling his BS as the other guy with the black but he had more horses at the sale. Only one of them was in any kind of competition. He claims it was so he could concentrate on winning the ranch horse competition. That was a bunch of horse pucky, there was more than enough time to get to other events on different horses, many sellers did it and the horse he did the ranch horse competition on was no where near the caliber of horse it would have taken to win that. He also wasn't a good enough rider/cow hand to even get close to winning that competition. He didn't even place in the top seven. The reason he didn't show his horses is because they weren't nearly what he talked them up to be and their sale price reflected that fact and the fact that neither he nor his wife could ride them well enough to make them look better than they were. A great rider can sell a dink of a horse by making it look better than it really is, that was in no danger of occurring with their horses. Not that they weren't decent riders, they were, they just weren't the caliber of rider it takes to make a dink horse look good.

Speaking of husband and wife horse trader teams, have you ever met a person who you can just tell has something icky on the inside by how they look on the outside and the general air about them? The kind my brother used to lean over and whisper to me when he saw one "_somebody needs to tell that lady crystal meth is bad for you_", always made me laugh, but anyway it isn't always drugs sometimes it is something else but you just get that vibe off them that "there is something very icky and wrong inside this person". Maybe it is because I have worked in law enforcement but I have learned to trust this gut feeling about people like that. I always figure it is like Abe Lincoln is rumored to have said about why he didn't hire a man for a job saying "_by the time a man is his age he has earned the face he wears_". Anyway I ran into two horse trader couples where the wife gave me the creeps at this sale and the two of them could have been twins, same dyed hair so black it is nearly purple, pasty white complexion and same sense of inner wrongness about them that even showed in how their horses interacted with them. I crossed various horses off my list to look at based on many things but this marks the first time I have ever marked off horses as never going to buy based on the just plain icky vibe their sellers gave off, and I don't mean the "_used horse trader vibe_" either, as I have run into plenty of them over the years.


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## AtokaGhosthorse (Oct 17, 2016)

I've met those same people. Not horse trading, but just... out and about in life. I know several men and women both and I cannot FORCE myself to like, nor get past that feeling of 'wrongness' about them. It's like new age hippie trippy folks describe as 'negative energy'. You can feel it in the air around them and it bothers me.

I used to think I was just a rude b-word for not overcoming it, but at the age of 46 now, I've learned things about these same people that explained why I felt that vibe around them. A few have fooled me lately though and I'm not sure if I'm slipping and losing my sensitivity to that vibe or if they were just that good at hiding it.

Hancock Horses - I don't know WHAT the deal is right now, but I'm seeing a LOT of them. A mean a lootttt. Hancock and Blue Valentine seem to be 'trendy in this area right now. This bay roan my daughter brought home has a substantial amount of Hancock on her bottom line.... IF you go back far enough. It's pretty far back there, but I think/hope the Hancock Stupid is outweighed by the Poco in that line and the Driftwood and Doc Bar in her top line. So far she's proving curious and willing to trust... again. She was supposedly mishandled by her original breeder as a foal/weanling and the previous owners didn't have time to earn her trust as an unhandled 3 year old. Who knows... but to me, sounds like some more of that 'horse trading' b.s. you were talking about.

That said, not my circus, not my monkey. I am firmly in a consultant only position on this filly - I have my hands full with AJ, Outback, and Trigger, but also am the primary care giver for Gina and Supes - my husband and son's horses.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

I think it is because Blue Valentine lines throw a lot of roan but even Blue Valentine had Hancock in him on his top side so when they put it back into those lines on top or bottom you end up with a lot of Hancock and other than breeders who breed Hancock lines I have yet to meet anyone who actually prefers Hancock lines over other cow horse lines like Little Peppy, Driftwood, Wimpy, Poco Bueno, Three Bars, Doc Bar, Leo, Doc O`Lena etc.


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## QtrBel (May 31, 2012)

The friend I have that breeds mostly trail horses went to Hancock on the dam's side. She has had a lot of success with the good, stout horses she has always bred. She always had those with good minds and feet - willing partners but people wanted more height and she couldn't convince these that more height didn't translate into more weight carrying ability. The Hancock gave her that height edge without sacrificing what she had.


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## AtokaGhosthorse (Oct 17, 2016)

SO. Here's what our Roper/Lineman friend who gave us Superman told my hubs around the campfire late last autumn:


(For context, he has a Hancock roping horse - Grey Momma)


He said:


Maaannnn. Those Hancock horses. If you can keep from KILLING THEM, I mean just putting a bullet in their head before they're 4 years old, and if you're prepared to deal with a Groundhog Day mentality (One step forward, two steps back, every. single. day.) for the first four years, you'll have a solid, bad-a horse. But you're gonna want to KILL THEM those first four, or even five years until they start to mentally mature.


My friend's barrel horse, Peso, and her 2 year old filly are both heavily Hancock... and she concurs. Slow to mentally mature, need a longer time to 'get' something they're being taught, but once it all clicks, they're all there and will be solid for life.


That sounds like something I don't have time for. Glad daughter's filly Taco has enough of the better foundation lines in her to weed the Hancock Stupids out.


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## AndyTheCornbread (Feb 3, 2019)

I had a Hancock mare that my old trainer(_he retired a few years ago_) cursed me for getting. Said it was exactly what you described, every day was back to square one for months until one day the light finally came on for her. Once she was solid I sold her to a professional barrel racer that loves her. She was race bred on the top and Hancock on the bottom. I'll probably never ride a faster horse, the trainer said in all his 40+ years of training he had never seen a faster horse much less ever been on one that fast. I don't have any use for a horse that fast, nothing I do warrants it, and she was the most hard headed horse I have ever owned save one that had mental issues from oxygen deprivation during birth. You know a horse is hard headed when the only horse I have ever had that was worse was mentally retarded. After my experiences with her and dealing with other people's Hancock horses I will never own another one.


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## AtokaGhosthorse (Oct 17, 2016)

That's what my friend's fillies are... Race bred on top to that Dash with Perks stallion, Steakin Six and Hancock on bottom. They're fast, they're lovely girls, nice disposition, but every day its a whole new world for them. But... she was breeding them to get barrel racers. She got what she desired, and now the hard part starts - training them. It's been... interesting... to hear her daily reports on Rosie and Mocha. LOL She did say once she gets them past the basics... tying, ponying on trails, saddling up, bearing weight - the intermediate to advanced training will be done by a friend of hers who has a LOT of Hancock training experience. She's done this her entire life, but will not attempt to finish out a Hancock Barrel Racer on her own. 



Nope. Not gonna do it.

Peso, her barrel horse... he is what he is. He's 8 and she's had absolute HELL with him, but he's getting there. Now him, she is working on him herself - because she's the only person he trusts. She wants him to have a solid pattern down, THEN work on speed. She takes him trail riding a lot to get his mind reset/mentally/emotionally stabilized and help desensitize him.


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