Horse Markings

Horses exhibit a diverse array of coat colors and distinctive markings, and a specialized vocabulary has evolved to describe them. In fact, one will often refer to a horse in the field by his or her coat color rather than by breed or by gender. Coat colors include:

Appaloosa - a breed of horse with spots, any color mixed with white. There are different patterns: blanket- white blanket that typically starts around or behind withers with dark spots mostly over the hips, snowflake - solid with white spots over hips, and leopard - which is white with dark spots over all the coat. A true Appaloosa is actually a breed, not a color.

Bay- From light brown to very dark brown with black mane and tail with black points. Three types - Dark bay, blood bay, light bay and just bay.

Black- There are two types of black, fading black and jet black. Ordinary black horses will fade to a rusty brownish color if the horse is exposed to sunlight on a regular basis. Jet black is a blue-black shade that is fadeproof. Black foals are usually born a mousy grey color. As their foal coat begins to shed out, their black color will show through,but jet black foals are born jet black. Usually for a horse to be considered black it must be completely black with no brown at all, only white markings.

Brown - A bay without any black points.

Buckskin- A bay horse with a gene that 'dilutes' the coat colour to a yellow, cream, or gold while keeping the black points.

Chestnut- A reddish body color with no black.

Cremello - A chestnut horse with two dilute genes that washes out almost all colour. Often called pseudo albinos, they have blue eyes. There are no true albino horses.

Dun - Yellowish brown with a dorsal stripe along the back and occasionally zebra stripings on the legs.

Fleabitten - refers to usually red hairs flecked in the coat of a gray horse.

Gray - A horse with black skin and clear hairs. Gray horses can be born any color, and eventually most will turn gray or white with age. If you would define the horse as white it is still grey unless it is albino. Some gray horses that are very light must wear sunscreen.

Grulla- A black horse with a dun gene. It is often a grayish/silver colored horse with dark dun factors.

Pinto - A multi-colored horse with large patches of brown, white, and/or black and white. Piebald is black and white, while Skewbald is white and brown. Specific patterns such as tobiano, overo, and tovero refer to the orientation of white on the body.

Paint - In 1962, the American Paint Horse Association began to recognize pinto horses with known Quarter Horse and/or Thoroughbred bloodlines as a separate breed. Today, Paint horses are the world's fifth most popular breed.

Palomino-Chesnut horse that has one cream dilute gene that turns the horse to a golden, yellow, or tan shade with a flaxen (white) mane and tail. Often cited as being a color "within three shades of a newly minted coin", palominos actually come in all shades from extremely light, to deep chocolate.

Perlino - Exactly like a cremello but a bay horse with two dilute genes.

Splash - A genetically controlled horse coat variation.

Tobiano - A genetic trait among horses which produces a characteristic white pattern in the coat.

White - Any non-albino white horse is called a gray, even though they appear white. All white, may be the result of overlapping pinto, appaloosa, or sabino markings. Rarely there are true white horses born and are documented to have a dominant white gene. These horses have normal eye colour, and they stay white for life.