Help on colour of grey and breeding?

[eml]

10 year old 'grey' Tb (pure french flat racing line) is white/grey with black and ginger fleabitten marks on a black skin but with various pink patches around muzzle. girth, back.

Are the pink patches old scar tissue or part of her colouring? If we bred a foal from her by a chestnut TB (old fashioned English steeplechase line) what would be the likely colour outcome?

[chev]

TBs do carry sabino, so the pink bits could be that - so she might throw foals with lots of white. But the pink on her back... you don't usually find sabino white on backs, so that could be scar tissue. Any pink skin on her legs? With extensive sabino (that marks muzzle and girth) you'd expect to find white legs too.

If there are definite black fleabites that would suggest that she is black or bay based. Horses that are chestnut before greying out cannot produce black pigment.

Likely colour outcomes are black, (least likely in my opinion; based on lines, few black TBs exist) bay, and chestnut; all have at least 50% chance of greying out. If it is sabino, you stand a good chance of lots of chrome. :)

[Lgd]

You need to know the colour of her parents - if both are grey and both of their parents are grey - then pretty much likely that it will grey out.

If one parent is a solid colour then there is a 50:50 chance of a non-grey. e.g. Tavia is by a grey stallion out of a grey mare - hence grey. Her Mum was homozygous grey and produced all grey offspring. Her sire was not and produced bay offspring as well. The stud had a grey arab (died last year) of his last four foals, three are bay, one is black and greying out.

[eml]

Thanks Chev I suspected you would know the answer!!

Yes she also has pink skin on legs and fleabitten marks are both brown and black although the latter are in the minority. French grandfather was chestnut according to 'Allpedigrees'

@help@ what is chrome? I am out of my depth here!

I know their are no guarentees in breeding and we are basically looking to breed in more substance as the mare has speed and stamina to die for but is just a bit too small/fine. To breed a chestnut would be a personal bonus to us
as a family project. I believe her first foal was grey but don't know who the sire was.

[ambatt]

'chrome' means lots of flashy white leg markings (and face too).

Just a thought, could the pink be equine vitiligo?

[chev]

Chrome = lots of white! :D What colour were her parents?

edit to add ambatt beat me to it! Yes - white can be down to vitiligo, which causes patches of mottled pink skin, especially around the mouth/eye area. Not so common in leg markings though - does she have white on her face, or just the muzzle?

[eml]

She has a pink skinned small blaze/large stripe!

As far as I can tell from pedigree greys predominate with a sprinkling of chestnut...no blacks and no bays for three generations.

[ambatt]

This is extreme equine vitiligo on a Lipizzaner stallion. (mine for so brief a time) You can see the extensive depigmentation, all the pink bits should be black skin.

http://i13.photobucket.com/albums/a299/ambatt/P5130667.jpg