Greys that stay grey

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maggiemoto

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Here is a question for the colour experts. It seems that most grey horses turn white with age. Our mare is now 14 and is still a beautiful dark dapple grey; why is this?
 
I'm no expert but am interested in colours and also greying. The grey gene does seem to 'work' at very different rates but my understanding is that all will end up 'white' if they live long enough. I have a gelding with grey, he is 7 and still quite obviously dun though you can see the grey at work too. His full sister is the same base colour but was more or less white at 4. Interestingly his breeder thinks the females she has bred seem to grey out quicker than the males. I have often wondered if the homozygous greys grey more quickly than heterozygous too but that is just a musing :)
 
Interesting. Mines 23 & still a fair way from white. Was almost black she was that dark as a youngster. Had some white in the form of white dapples on dark grey coat by 10, fully dappled by 12/13. By 17/18 light grey but still very much dappled. Now at 23 she's a fleabitten grey, but with a lot of dark flecks. Coat is also more a silvery grey rather than white in most places. When clean its still noticeable where her original white sock was. Mum was a usual grey connie & dad was a dark bay, although I've been told sires sire was grey too.
 
Interesting indeed.
My sec a looked like this at 2 (just rescued so excuse the state!
df41560b.jpg


By the time he was 6 he looked like this
3b2b11d5.jpg


Now 11yrs and still as white!
Bizarre
 
Melanin is the pigment that gives hair its colour.
It comes in the form of Eumelanin in Black based horses eg. Bays, Blacks, Buckskins etc. and in the form Pheomelanin in Red based horses eg. Chesnuts, Palominos etc..

The grey gene gradually stops producing melanin which eventually makes the hair colourless.

Just like people, genetics play a part and if a persons parents went grey in their early 30's they will probably go grey about that age too.
If a persons one parent went grey at 20yo and the other parent went grey at 50yo it would be more difficult to guess when they would go grey.

Horses would be the same as even if both parents were grey and had both passed the grey gene (Homozygous) you wouldn't know how quickly the melanin would stop being produced because you wouldn't know genetically which parent it took after (like the humans parent where one went grey at 20yo and the other went grey at 50yo)

I hope this makes sense? KarynK will probably give you a better explanation :)


But basically they will all go white eventually if they live long enough :)
 
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