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snowflake? or varnish?

in your opinion is this considered varnish or snowflake? The mare is one I grew up with and she was about 18 years old in this photo. She was bay as a baby and progressively more snowflakes/roaning as she got older, but never lost her 'lacing' on her sides. Her dam was heavily varnished appy and sire was an appendix QH (don't recall what color, bay or chestnut I think). Sorry for the bad photo quality- it is scanned from a print. I wish I could find a photo of her at about 8-10 years, where her snowflake pattern was more obvious, but this was the only one I could find. [img]http://www.aphelionart.com/quin.jpg[/img]

lipigirl Mon, 07/26/2010 - 14:31

OK I am no expert on LP but I would guess varnish on this one not snowflake, is there a possibility of any grey in there too? I love your name so do you have any Crias???

Crias Mon, 07/26/2010 - 14:52

no gray- as I said she was about 18 years old in that photo. I an a bit confused on snowflake vs frosting now too trying to reaserch it a bit. Some appys that they call snowflake are almost like birdcatcher spotting (not genetically, but in looks) - small solid white dots on a darker base color; others refer to her pattern of 'lighter roan dapples' as snowflake. Can any appy people clarrify for me. I have now seen horses with lighter dapples refer to this effect as 'frosted' too.

Lipigirl I used to have lots of llamas, now just dogs, but it is a username I have used for many years and is easy for me to remember :) My mom still breeds llamas --> http://www.burnsllamatrailblazers.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

lipigirl Mon, 07/26/2010 - 16:08

LOL just got my first llama 3 weeks ago and an alpaca wether too - they are great and we trek with them on our land.

accphotography Mon, 07/26/2010 - 20:11

One of the strangest things I've ever seen. i've never seen LP dapple like that. CRAAAAAZY cool!!!

I vote varnish.

JNFerrigno Mon, 07/26/2010 - 22:41

She is 18 in that photo? Had she been younger I would have said varnish. But all our varnish mares are totally roaned out way before then. Can varnish be minimally expressed?

AppyLady Mon, 07/26/2010 - 23:51

Varnish roan, although she might have had snowflakes in her younger days. I used to have a mare colored just like her -- dapples and all! Yes, LP roans can be very minimally expressed, although I usually don't call them varnish unless they roan out enough to reveal varnish marks.

Crias Tue, 07/27/2010 - 08:28

so is snowflake really just a minimal or delayed expression of varnish in your opinion Appy? Or do some stay snowflake until very old age?

NZ Appaloosas Mon, 08/16/2010 - 20:30

[quote="Crias"]so is snowflake really just a minimal or delayed expression of varnish in your opinion Appy? Or do some stay snowflake until very old age?[/quote]

IMO, snowflake is a pattern in and of itself...little white dots/streaks which can come and go. This is based on the fact that we've had several snowflakes that only had "moving" spots, and no other varnishing going on with their coat colour.

Diane

AppyLady Tue, 08/17/2010 - 16:05

According to the Appaloosa Project, snowflake and varnish are just different expressions of LP roaning. That's why I've said that the difference between snowflake and varnish is often just a matter of opinion! Genetically, they're the same.

judiw Mon, 10/20/2014 - 16:25

I hope you come back to this thread sometime, I also sent you an email.

My inlaws sold an Appy mare to someone in Oregon in the early (I think) 1970's. She was exactly that color and I was wondering if your mare could be her foal or grand daughter. Her name was Tom Tom's Folly and  I seem to have a vague memory of some mention of llamas. :-)  The mare was sold from Moses Lake, Wn.

Thanks,

judiw

 

Crias Wed, 12/10/2014 - 22:08

Hi Judi- my mom got this mare, who she called Quin, in late 70's as a weanling, and at that time she appeared solid bay with no Appy characteristics.  She was not registered so I don't know her pedigree.  I did see photos of Quin's dam, who I think was in her teens, and she was like 90% varnished out.  I know Quin's sire was an appendix QH.  I think the call name of her dam was 'Lady', but don't know the registered name.  Sorry I can't provide any better specifics.  BTW we didn't get llamas until like 1994, so didn't have them when Quin was young.

 

She was a very handy and athletic little mare, but quite a spooky thing.  My mom trained her through second level dressage and she was scopy over fences too.  She was sold around 1996 and was shown on the pony hunter/jumper circuit in Bend, OR area After that.

judiw Fri, 12/12/2014 - 21:48

In reply to by Crias

Thanks for the response.  Llamas aside (I could be mistaken there) , I do wonder if she was out of the mare but have recently seen some wild horses from around your area someplace showing that dappled, varnish color pattern so who knows.

I had to laugh, I broke the mare when she was a 4 yr old  pasture pet (my mother-in-law inherited the horses from her brother George Phippen, a cowboy artist from Arizona, and she wasn't a horse person). I had only ridden as a kid at that time and didn't really know much. The mare could jump a little, I used to canter her out in the sagebrush outside of Moses Lake and she wouldn't rein well enough in a hackamore to go around stuff but sailed effortlessly over some pretty big bushes and never broke a stride. I  don't remember her being particularly spooky but I owned her first foal for awhile and one reason I sold her was her strong tendency to spook. 

I don't know much about the mare's sire except I have seen an oil painting of him and he was the same color as your mare.  Her dam was red varnished roan and had several foals that colored late. The daughter I sold  had a small blanket and spots but roaned out to mostly white as did some of her foals. One colt remained leopard and did very well as a performance sire in Montana, he produced some national level gaming horses I think.  Folly was 1/2 sister to Arizona State Open Reining Champion and Appaloosa Junior National Champion Reining Horse who  went on to place 5th in the big Open stock Horse Competition at Cow Palace competing against the best QHs. That mare produced a National Champion Hackamore Reining horse.  So if they were indeed related your mare came by her handiness honestly. :-)

Thanks again for the reply