what are the chances of that? skewbald foals

[~*sugarlump*~]

in the field by my house there are two mares, both are dark chestnut with one or 2 white socks. both have skewbald foals about the same age. im not very good on ages but i think wither the mare has the same foal from last year, or she has had 2 foals 2 years running (seems a little bit unlikely). i dont knwo what the sires colourings were, or even if the were the same sires

i know there is a stallion around somewhere but ive never seen him so have no idea on what colour he could be
and i was just curious if the sire was the same (which i have an inkling might be true) what would be the colouring of the sire?

thanks for any suggestions :)
SL xx

[chev]

The sire(s) would be coloured. The only way for a solid mare to throw a coloured foal is for her to have been covered by a coloured stallion.

So... we know the stallion was coloured. If he has one coloured gene, then the chances of him throwing a coloured foal to a chestnut mare are 50/50.

If he has two coloured genes, he'll *always* throw coloured foals to chestnut mares - 100% chance of coloured foal (no chance, in fact, of anything else!)

So although is looks like a huge coincidence to see two coloured foals with two solid mares, in fact the odds of that happening when a coloured stallion is used are quite high.

Whereas if a solid stallion is used, there's no chance whatsoever you'd get a coloured foal!