[QtrBel]

Red is recessive (e). A red based horse will be ee. One e from mom. One e from dad. Black (the gene is called Extension) is dominant (E). A horse can be EE or Ee. Either will be black or bay. Both of your horse's parents were Ee. Both passed their e and your horse is ee so he is red. In order for a horse to be bay the horse has to carry dominant agouti which restricts where black shows up on the horse. Agouti does not affect red horses. A black horse has recessive agouti (aa) and a bay horse can be AA or Aa. This is only important when breeding. A bay horse that is EEAA will only ever produce a bay based foal no matter what they are bred to. A black EE aa though can have or sire a bay foal if the horse bred to passes an A but will never have/sire a red foal because it will always pass E. A red horse bred to a red will always produce red but a red bred to a black or bay if the genes are present in what they are bred to can produce red, bay or black. Two bays, two blacks or a bay and black bred together if they both carry e can produce red, bay of black as well. No mystery to it. There are many other genes that effect color but those two produce the base color for all horses. The others are what give you other colors. Example - adding in Cream. A single cream gene dilutes the color of the hair. If paired with red is palomino, bay is buckskin and black is smokey black. If a horse inherits two copies of cream then everything is diluted and hair even more so. You have cremello, perlino and smokey cream.

If you look up Mendel's pea plant experiments you will see the explanation on how dominant and recessive genes work.

 

[LoriF]

It's pretty much the same as brown eyes and blue eyes on people. Two blue eyed people can only produce blue eyed offspring two brown eyed people can produce an array of colors of eyes because they can be carrying recessives covered up by the brown gene which is dominant.

 

[Linoone]

Hey everyone, So, I was told that, if you breed two chestnuts the foal will definitely born chestnut. My horse is a chestnut, but I wonder how did he come out a chestnut, because his father was pitch black and her mother was dark bay. It is kinda funny funny because my horse has a a brother from the same stallion and mare and was also born a chestnut. How is that possible?

Chestnut (AKA: Red) is recessive.

Recessive genes can be carried "silently" for generations, only gaining the possibility to pop up again when another matching recessive is added to the genepool. The fact that your horse has a full brother who is also a Chestnut only confirms that both parents are carriers of Red.

Works the same way for red hair in humans.

Two Redheads = Only Redheaded children.

A Redhead and a Redhead Carrier = Half Redheaded children, half Redhead Carrier children.

Two Redhead Carriers = One-fourth Redhead, half Redhead Carrier and one-fourth non-Redhead Carrier children.

 

[Chevaux]

Good explanations. I always feel, when reading through any posts on colour dynamics, that it would be easier for me to understand quantum physics than get all the nuances of colouring 🤣

 

[walkinthewalk]

Good explanations. I always feel, when reading through any posts on colour dynamics, that it would be easier for me to understand quantum physics than get all the nuances of colouring 🤣

Meeee too. Well said💐💐

 

[SteadyOn]

Colours can be so interesting!

My horse is a very classic bay colour. Her sire was a dark bay, and her dam was chestnut.

She was bred to another bay (Quidam de Revel, in fact!) yeeears and yeeeears ago. They produced a bay filly. That filly went on to be bred to a buckskin stallion. Their filly?

Palomino.

Wild, right?

 

[jumps_are_life]

Thanks everyone!