# Looking For Pics



## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Of BROWN and BAY horses that show the difference really clearly. Also, for you color gurus (ooops the language po-po are gonna come get me, that's one of the words never to be used again, LOL!), can you give me a clear, concise and easily understandable definition of what brown is, why it's brown and not bay? Is it merely an absence of agouti? Or ???????? 

What I'm trying to figure out is, if I bred a cremello stallion to a 'brown' mare, what color would the foal be? I'm looking at a QH mare that is defined as brown and I like her pedigree, haven't seen her in person yet, and I'm wondering what her color components might be.


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## kenda (Oct 10, 2008)

If the mare was homozygous for black and the brown agouti gene, you'd get a brownskin. If not, you could get a palomino, a buckskin, a smoky black, or a brownskin depending on what her genetic make up was.

Edit to add that it would also depend on what agouti genes the stallion was hiding.


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

kenda said:


> If the mare was homozygous for black and the brown agouti gene, you'd get a brownskin. If not, you could get a palomino, a buckskin, a smoky black, or a brownskin depending on what her genetic make up was.
> 
> Edit to add that it would also depend on what agouti genes the stallion was hiding.


If the mare was brown, she couldn't carry a bay agouti gene, as brown is recessive to bay.


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

Dreamcatcher Arabians said:


> Of BROWN and BAY horses that show the difference really clearly. Also, for you color gurus (ooops the language po-po are gonna come get me, that's one of the words never to be used again, LOL!), can you give me a clear, concise and easily understandable definition of what brown is, why it's brown and not bay? Is it merely an absence of agouti? Or ????????
> 
> What I'm trying to figure out is, if I bred a cremello stallion to a 'brown' mare, what color would the foal be? I'm looking at a QH mare that is defined as brown and I like her pedigree, haven't seen her in person yet, and I'm wondering what her color components might be.


Brown is a mutation of the agouti allele. There are three mutations of this allele - A (classic bay) A+ (wild bay) and At (brown). Phenotypically, each of these restricts black in different ways. All three restrict black to the "hard" points of the horse - mane, tail, legs. Wild bay restricts it further, causing low black on the legs, and often a lack of black in the mane and tail. Classic bay just restricts it to the hard points. Brown doesn't mind if black is on the body of the horse, but makes the "soft" points paler - the muzzle, flank, elbow, behind the eye etc. 

Wild Bay:









Classic Bay:









Brown:









Just like any other colour, there can be a wide variety of range in the shade of each of these colours. I picked them based on giving a good example of the differences - some bays are much darker, some browns are much lighter.


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## Adenfire (Dec 2, 2010)

My Stallion is registered Bay, but most definitely brown, only time he's "red" is in the winter when his hair is SUPER long...

Shed out:









Clipped:









Winter: Sorry he's laying down, but you can see his underside is real light, red on his sides then dark up top


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Chiilaa said:


> Brown is a mutation of the agouti allele. There are three mutations of this allele - A (classic bay) A+ (wild bay) and At (brown). Phenotypically, each of these restricts black in different ways. All three restrict black to the "hard" points of the horse - mane, tail, legs. Wild bay restricts it further, causing low black on the legs, and often a lack of black in the mane and tail. Classic bay just restricts it to the hard points. Brown doesn't mind if black is on the body of the horse, but makes the "soft" points paler - the muzzle, flank, elbow, behind the eye etc.
> 
> Wild Bay:
> 
> ...



Ok, let me see if I've got this straight. Brown and Agouti are variations of the same modifier, but Brown doesn't restrict black to the points, and 'fades' the soft points? So, would a "brown" horse be able to throw a true buckskin with a cremello? It doesn't sound like it, more like you'd get the sooty variations? Is that correct?


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## Bridgertrot (Dec 2, 2011)

So I'm usually horrible at color calculations with certain colors so chiilaa will have to check me but here's my slight shot in the dark. Let's see how wrong I am LOL. I'm thinking brownskin, smokey black, or Palomino? *dies* I know it will have one cream. I'm surprised the foal color calculator doesn't have brown included. I went there to check myself bit no help.
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Bridgertrot said:


> So I'm usually horrible at color calculations with certain colors so chiilaa will have to check me but here's my slight shot in the dark. Let's see how wrong I am LOL. I'm thinking brownskin, smokey black, or Palomino? *dies* I know it will have one cream. I'm surprised the foal color calculator doesn't have brown included. I went there to check myself bit no help.
> _Posted via Mobile Device_


That's what I did too. When I didn't find brown as a base color, it made me start thinking about how it was created and was there a modifier involved or no? I knew someone on here would have an answer or at the very least point me in the right direction to get started.


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## NdAppy (Apr 8, 2009)

Brown, when bred to a cremello can still have a bay foal. The bay form agouti could be comming from the cremello and not the brown.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

NdAppy said:


> Brown, when bred to a cremello can still have a bay foal. The bay form agouti could be comming from the cremello and not the brown.


Ok, I'll buy that if the cremello carries agouti, they could have buckskin? But not bay because the cremello will always pass on the dilution gene.


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

Dreamcatcher Arabians said:


> Ok, let me see if I've got this straight. Brown and Agouti are variations of the same modifier, but Brown doesn't restrict black to the points, and 'fades' the soft points? So, would a "brown" horse be able to throw a true buckskin with a cremello? It doesn't sound like it, more like you'd get the sooty variations? Is that correct?


Agouti is the name of the allele - the "a" locus if you will. Brown, bay and wild bay are all mutations of agouti - mutations at the "a" locus.

Brown can often restrict black in ways that make it mimic bay. This shows a few of the variations of brown that are "normal" for brown. Bear in mind, this picture is fairly old, and since then lots of other horses have been tested positive too. It's just really hard to google "tested brown horse" and get any sort of meaningful results lol.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Chiilaa said:


> Agouti is the name of the allele - the "a" locus if you will. Brown, bay and wild bay are all mutations of agouti - mutations at the "a" locus.
> 
> Brown can often restrict black in ways that make it mimic bay. This shows a few of the variations of brown that are "normal" for brown.


OK, so I guess what I'm getting at, bottom line: Do I want a brown mare to breed to a cremello stallion to produce a buckskin foal or should I stick with a strictly bay EE/AA mare to get what I want? Conformation/Pedigree/Temper all being equal.


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

Dreamcatcher Arabians said:


> OK, so I guess what I'm getting at, bottom line: Do I want a brown mare to breed to a cremello stallion to produce a buckskin foal or should I stick with a strictly bay EE/AA mare to get what I want? Conformation/Pedigree/Temper all being equal.


That depends on the results of the cremello stallion's agouti status. If he is AA, then a brown mare's AtAt won't matter, as A is dominant over At (well that is the theory anyway). If he is Aa or aa, then you could get a brown based buckskin instead. Definitely a delicious option (not that I am biased, it's not like it's my favourite colour or anything *whistles*).


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## DriftingShadow (Jun 4, 2012)

I had a thread asking about Drifter that led to me getting a DNA test from Pet DNA because everyone was so on the fence about him. According to the $60 test offered on their site .. Drifter is AAt which from my understanding means he is a bay carrying the brown gene. It was all really confusing to me, but fascinating none the less.

Here is a picture of him! As you can see his muzzle went light this winter for the first time (which is the reason I questions if he was truly bay). There is no other lighter portion on his body.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Chiilaa said:


> That depends on the results of the cremello stallion's agouti status. If he is AA, then a brown mare's AtAt won't matter, as A is dominant over At (well that is the theory anyway). If he is Aa or aa, then you could get a brown based buckskin instead. Definitely a delicious option (not that I am biased, it's not like it's my favourite colour or anything *whistles*).


That's a nice lookin' pony, Chili! I wouldn't object to one that looked like that. I'm sending off the stallion's tail hair in about a week or so, going to get a full color profile on him to find out what he's carrying for sure. Then I'll know. 

Right now, I'm just looking at mares to breed to him, looking for the right temper, right confo, right pedigree to compliment him, AND get a pretty colored horse into the bargain.  I was asking about the brown because Arabians don't recognize brown as a color and the Animal Genetics site doesn't mention the At stuff at all. I'll look to a different lab for that test on any brown/bay mares, I guess.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

DriftingShadow said:


> I had a thread asking about Drifter that led to me getting a DNA test from Pet DNA because everyone was so on the fence about him. According to the $60 test offered on their site .. Drifter is AAt which from my understanding means he is a bay carrying the brown gene. It was all really confusing to me, but fascinating none the less.
> 
> Here is a picture of him! As you can see his muzzle went light this winter for the first time (which is the reason I questions if he was truly bay). There is no other lighter portion on his body.


Can you give me a link to the lab you used?


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## DriftingShadow (Jun 4, 2012)

Dreamcatcher Arabians said:


> Can you give me a link to the lab you used?


here you are!

Pet DNA Testing Lab

They were recommended to me by Verona in the thread I had started. I opted for the $60 comprehensive DNA test. Hope it helps!


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

DriftingShadow said:


> here you are!
> 
> Pet DNA Testing Lab
> 
> They were recommended to me by Verona in the thread I had started. I opted for the $60 comprehensive DNA test. Hope it helps!


Thanks! I've printed out the sample card so when I find that 'right' mare, I'll be able to check for At. I haven't found another lab that does that test.


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

Dreamcatcher Arabians said:


> Thanks! I've printed out the sample card so when I find that 'right' mare, I'll be able to check for At. I haven't found another lab that does that test.


Pet DNA is the only lab that offers it.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Thanks for the info everyone. This will help in my search for the "perfect" mare!


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## maggiesshowjumping (Jan 3, 2013)

bay is a brown horse with black hair restricted to the points, ie legs, nose, mane, tail, etc while brown horses do not have the black points, their points are brown. they have a brown mane and tail vs a black one. hope that helps


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## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

maggiesshowjumping said:


> bay is a brown horse with black hair restricted to the points, ie legs, nose, mane, tail, etc while brown horses do not have the black points, their points are brown. they have a brown mane and tail vs a black one. hope that helps


This is wrong. Brown horses still have black points.


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## Kayella (Feb 11, 2012)

Take a look at Henny. He was the result of a perlino mare and homozygous black stud. He is Ata. The perlino is brown based rather than bay based. In the summer he was a nice creamy buckskin but he slowly got darker as his winter coat came in. now he's a deep caramel brown with tan soft points and his one leg that doesn't have a lot of white on it is black. I am personally a fan of brownskins  I will have to show pictures when I get home!
_Posted via Mobile Device_


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## Kayella (Feb 11, 2012)

Sorry for a double post!! Got home sooner than I thought. Okay, the first picture is him as a foal. The second is when I brought him home in August. And the last is him now in his winter coat. I get a new pony every season it seems! :lol:


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## NdAppy (Apr 8, 2009)

Brownskin.... NOM. I love that color.


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## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

Very pretty little fella!


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