Horse Economics. Vera Kurskaya

for her questions, which were always very difficult to answer, but I did my best, and they made me go out of my comfort zone and move far forward.

      I thank all the owners, breeders, breed associations, and photographers from around the world who helped provide the photos for this book, and of course, I thank Trafalgar Square Books for making my book available for English-speaking horse people.

      Vera Kurskaya

      CHAPTER 1:

       Introduction to Horse Color

      What Is Horse Color?

      To begin, it is necessary to offer my own definition of horse color. A horse’s “color” is genetically determined as the sum of color characteristics of the entire integument (natural outer covering of the animal), including hair, skin, hooves, and eyes.

      I must emphasize that, first of all, we must both consider and come to understand the genetic approach to horse color. Second, it is important not to limit ourselves by paying attention to the horse’s hair (coat) color only. Of course, you need to look at the horse in order to determine his color, but simultaneously, for a precise determination, you must also understand the genetic mechanisms of the formation of color, special features of pigment production, and how pigment is distributed over the body. (The latter especially helps during determination and differentiation of colors connected with the admixture of white hair.) Finally, an analysis of a horse’s ancestry helps further when faced with unresolved questions regarding color and pattern.

      The color in horses and other mammals is stable over the course of the animal’s entire life. Changes that can modify the color characteristics of the hair cover (coat) of an individual horse during his lifetime are simply variations in one and the same color. While it is difficult to determine “final” coat color in a foal, specific diagnostic regularities (characteristics) can be observed, even at a very young age. In fact, color is a combination of several signs and characteristics. This is true regarding any color, even if its description seems deceptively simple. For example, pigmentation of hooves must be considered in coat color determination, since in certain cases Appaloosa color can be verified only with the help of a visible pattern of stripes on the horse’s hooves.

      COLOR VARIATIONS

      Each color has its own variations, which are called shades and differ from each other in terms of the color nuances of hair. Unfortunately, many horse people completely overlook this aspect: While figuring out a horse’s color, they try to find a photograph that exactly corresponds to his exterior appearance. Finding two animals that completely match each other in all details is extremely difficult, if not impossible, so many people, in the end, cannot determine the color of their horses and remain confused. This is the wrong way to go about color identification, since the majority of colors can be described with the help of several characteristics, regardless of variations in shade (see p. 68 for more on color shades).

      TYPES OF HAIR

      In horses, the hair on the body can be divided into several categories:

       Body (soft, short).

       Guard (mane, tail, feathers, and also “beard” on the lower jaw, although usually meant only to describe the hair of the mane and tail, which serves for the protection from insects, sun, and cold).

       Tactile (whiskers, eyebrow).

Color Terms

      The nomenclature I’ll rely on for colors is influenced by the traditional names long prevailing in the Russian color science and practice, and in equestrian pursuits, supplemented to reflect popular usage in the world at large. American geneticist Dr. Dan Philip Sponenberg (2009) stated that “the ideal nomenclature of the names of colors of horses can be that, in which each unique name of color corresponds with the specific genotype, and each specific genotype has a unique name of the corresponding color. Such precise connection between the genotypes and the colors is absent from all systems and nomenclatures. This happens sometimes for biological reasons, but it is much more frequent for cultural and historical reasons.” As an example, “red” coat color in the English language is a single category, and all variations are built on the basis of the word “chestnut.” But there are three concepts of chestnut in the Russian language—“red,” “brown,” and “flaxen chestnut”—and there are also three in Spanish.

Classification of Colors

      Dr. Sponenberg (2003) separates the base colors black, bay, and red, and Dr. Anne Bowling (2000) calls the base colors black (including bay) and red, with both scientists relying on genetics. In principle, both their versions are accurate, since black and bay are determined by identical alleles of the Extension gene (see pp. 14 and 108 for more on this). In this book, I basically adhere to Dr. Sponenberg’s classification—with small changes and refinements. I divide horse colors as follows.

      BASE COLORS

       Bay

       Black (including dominant black)

       Seal brown

       Chestnut (including red, brown, and flaxen chestnut)

      DILUTED COLORS

      Colors determined by cream dilution:

       Buckskin

       Smoky black

       Smoky seal brown

       Palomino

       Double cream

      “Wild” colors determined by the Dun gene:

       Bay dun

       Grullo

       Brown dun

       Red dun

      Silver colors:

       Silver bay

       Silver seal brown

       Silver black (including silver dapple)

      Champagne colors:

       Amber champagne

       Classic champagne

       Sable champagne

       Gold champagne

      Pearl colors:

       Bay pearl

       Black pearl

       Seal brown pearl

       Chestnut pearl

      Mixed diluted colors (colors determined simultaneously by combinations of different dilution genes):

       Dun and cream

       Dun and silver

       Cream and silver

       Cream and champagne

       Cream and pearl

       And others

      COLORS DUE TO ADMIXTURE OF WHITE HAIR

       Gray

       Roan

       Spotted

       Appaloosa-spotting