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Pink skin UNDER pigmented hair?

gypsycobs October 10, 2011 October 10, 2011

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Hi Everyone Just wondering if someone can point me in the direction of good articles and or share your own personal knowledge with me regarding lack of skin pigment despite coat pigment. My Gypsy Cob yearling is a light pally, dark eyes mottled skin on his dock, sheath, testicles, bum and a few little sprinkles in the 'arm pit' region. He is also very heavily mottled so much so that unless you look closely you would just say dark skin around his eyes and muzzle. The rest of his skin is white / pink (same as a double cream dilute) despite having a colour wash if you will over most of his body, he does have some white markings... blaze, four white socks, belly splash, rump splash and a bit on his neck. His sire is pally, dam is chestnut with white mane and tail. I have e-mailed D. Phillip Sponenberg and here is our conversation, firstly his reply to basically the above and a whole lot of photos. Basically though Im still none the wiser. "Hmm. These are tough! I suspect he's a pale palomino sabino with lots and lots of white. That would explain the dark skin in some areas. As he matures the "colored" spots will likely end up more obviously gold. Phil" ----------------------------- "Thanks for your reply. So he will possibly darken? He is cream all over really, not a great deal of white like I said... so there is still a possibility he will darken despite the fact his skin is pink? Is there any further reading I can do? I am very interested to know the in's and out's of all of this. Would it be wise to re do the SB test? I'm also assuming he carries splash as the bottom half of his face is white as is his dam. Is there any where I can look up that will give me an indication of the types of white he will throw on his foals? Once again, thank you so much for your time. Regards, Melinda" ----------------------------- "I think he'll likely darken, and then we'll know better what sort of white patterns he has. He may well have splash, plus or minus sabino." Thanks

Daylene Alford Wed, 11/02/2011 - 20:34

Well in a very selfish sort of way I'm glad he tested negative for everything. Not having an explanation :love makes him much more fun. ymwhisle ymwhisle

gypsycobs Wed, 11/02/2011 - 21:04

%-( naughty admin ... bad! :rofl
I wonder if there will be any explanations to be had in his foals, and I don't know how I will last that long without knowing why he has pink skin considdering he is a virgin it's going to be a very long wait! ~x(

CMhorses Thu, 11/03/2011 - 17:16

When he gets old enough if there is not a Lp test out then, you could breed him to solid, non characteristic mares from spotted dams/sires, if you get a spotted foal, you know he has Lp.Even that could take a while though, you would have to hope that the mare had PATN and hope they both passed their app genes to the foal.
Do you have pictures of his dam's sire? also do you have any more pictures of her foals?
I know there were 2 pictures of his dam where it looks like she has a roaned butt, could be Lp roaning there.
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=…
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=…

gypsycobs Thu, 11/03/2011 - 20:26

Hi CMhorses, thanks for your post. So much better than Admins who is in the naughty corner with her comments of it being exciting! :rofl

Sorry to say I have no idea what colour Bo's maternal grandsire was (would be helpful I know) and his dam, Gold Touch is only a four year old so has only had Bo and the chestnut filly, both to the same pally stallion. She is progressivly 'roaning' out from the rump towards her wither - I don't know if that helps??

I don't know if it will turn anything up but I am about to send off theDNA profiles for Bo's dam and grand-dam to the Gypsy Horse Data Base, if by chance something does come of it I could maybe find out colours from there, as in if we get pedigree info that is.

Daylene Alford Thu, 11/03/2011 - 21:52

[quote]Hi CMhorses, thanks for your post. So much better than Admins who is in the naughty corner with her comments of it being exciting! [/quote]

*Sigh* I suppose I can TRY to be helpful :twisted: :rofl

[quote]She is progressivly 'roaning' out from the rump towards her wither[/quote]

This is how varnish roan starts :bounce :bounce

CMhorses Thu, 11/03/2011 - 23:58

Fully agreed with admin about the varnish. From this, it sounds like his dam is Lp and varnishing out, he inherited it causing the mottled skin and he can pass it on to offspring at a 50% rate. I suspect it came from his dam's sire since his granddam was in her 20's without any varnishing, and even though she was black, I would think something would have shown up by that age. It really sounds like this puzzle is solved for the most part.

Also, I'm not sure much good could come from asking registries about colors. Generally they are very wrong, and colors listed as a foal could have changed by adulthood. For example, I know the appaloosa QH's parents/ancestors were listed as solid, and roaned some later in life. Just as my mom has a mare she registered as bay as a foal when she is believed to be smokey black now that we are more educated on colors.

gypsycobs Fri, 11/04/2011 - 18:22

Ok Admin, your out of the corner now... for the time being :love hahaha

CMhorses, re the DNA data bank, I should have been clearer.. what I was thinking was maybe we can get a sire match to Bo's dam, if we can do that I can have the data base be in contact with the owners of the profile and ask them to contact me, that way I may be able to get photos of the horse or at least ask them what colour he was to the best of their knowledge. That just might offer some insight if that makes sense?

And to totally throw a spanner in the Lp works... there are Cobs out there who show no expression what so ever who have produced spotted babies! I think Cobs like doing these ones to genetics sometimes :booty
Danni, have you still got photos or links to these cobs?

Monsterpony Fri, 11/04/2011 - 20:48

The non-expressing appy that produces an appy is an LP thing, not just a cob thing. There are many examples of totally solid appearing horses producing spotted foals in all Lp carrying breeds.

gypsycobs Fri, 11/04/2011 - 22:19

thats really interesting thanks for telling me. I wonder do the people par taking in the Appaloosa Project Research accept this? Only that a few emails I have had said it can't / won't / doesn't happen - however if there is proof to the contrary then I can't understand why they don't believe it????

Monsterpony Fri, 11/04/2011 - 23:12

I should specify that the 'totally solid' is in the eyes of people that don't necessarily know what to look for. A researcher in the Appaloosa Project would probably be able to identify any 'solid' appy, but someone that is not experienced with finding the minimal expression could easily miss it. That is where 'crop-outs' come from. Tobiano, splash white, frame, appaloosa and other white patterns can be so minimal as to be almost unrecognizable as carrying those patterns. Frame in particular can be present without having a single white hair to indicate its presence. LadyHawke has an appaloosa mare that didn't show any signs of Lp until after age 20 and the people from the appaloosa project had to search [i]very[/i] thoroughly to find her mottled skin.

Threnody Sat, 11/05/2011 - 09:23

Oh wow. I must have missed the discussion on LadyHawke on the AP Monsterpony. Is there an image of her?

NZ Appaloosas Tue, 12/06/2011 - 18:24

Not much to see...she's "solid" black but for one white 'tear drop' that's below one eye (was she sporting that when you were here, MP? I can't remember)which seems to be hormone related...it disappears when she's preggers and takes a while after weaning to come back. Her mottled skin is located in an area that requires a level of intimacy that I would expect from a vet and/or AI tech...if you get my drift :rofl

A couple of years ago, her hooves finally developed "proper" striping, but in fact, it was her feet that clued me in to begin with...they had very thin "pinstripes" of white (on non-white legs), giving her feet a slatey grey look rather than the normal dark. I even back combed her hair (as best possible) trying to see if there were thin little coronet socks making the striping, and when I couldn't, I brought this up to Sheila's attention. After that is when we made the arrangements to bring Rebecca and Sheila out here, and the two girls went over the loverly Ms Pearl with a very fine-toothed comb and found her mottled skin as well as the tiniest bit of sclera.

So, yeah, to the 'average' horse person, she's a solid, to the folk who use everything in reach to examine a horse, she's not a solid.

Diane

RiddleMeThis Wed, 12/07/2011 - 21:28

[quote=NZ Appaloosas]they are offering it now as a regular test?[/quote]
Theyve been offering it since the beginning of November.

NZ Appaloosas Thu, 12/08/2011 - 18:17

kewl beans! I've been remiss in some areas, what with everything we've been dealing with this past year...hopefully things are calming down so I can get back on track.

TheSwingHorse Mon, 12/12/2011 - 12:08

Celeste Huston on FB posted this... is it true? I'm confused now... lol

"I have just spoken to the lab Animal Genetics in Florida--THEY DO NOT HAVE A DEFINITIVE TEST FOR THE APPALOOSA LP GENE..they have a "portion" of markers, but NO definitive test..Therefore, one could send a test of a visually absolute LP leopard appaloosa and the markers could come back NEGATIVE!! Therefore , there is NOT a definitive positive test on this gene. I just spoke this minute to the lab! Also, I received a email from Dr Phillip Sponenberg, author of 3 volumns of Equine Genetics and he stated there is a test coming due, but to his knowledge NOT out there yet..I suggest, if one has questions about this to write to the Canadian research team of DR Archer!!!"

NZ Appaloosas Mon, 12/12/2011 - 17:46

I'm confused as well...I knew AGFLA was doing testing if requested, and that it was based on markers rather than the actual Lp, but this is the first I've heard that it can come back negative???

Daylene Alford Mon, 12/12/2011 - 19:06

Any test that uses markers instead of the actual mutation has a chance of returning a false negative (or a false positive). This is because the test checks for allele(s) that are "normally" linked with the mutation instead of the actual mutation. It is possible, because of genetic crossover, for these markers to "come unlinked" from the mutation. If this happens any horse descended from the original "crossover horse" will test negative for the markers while carrying the actual mutation or test positive for the markers while being negative for the actual mutation. The chance of a crossover occurring will vary with the distance the "marker alleles" are from the genetic mutation. If they are very close (genetically speaking of course) the chance of crossover will be near 0%.

That being said, labs that offer marker testing are usually pretty thorough in making sure their tests are fairly accurate. Just guessing, I would say better than 90%.

NZ Appaloosas Mon, 12/12/2011 - 20:21

Ahhh...the way the post above is worded makes it sound more "iffy" than that. I guess I just presumed that people would realise that the fact that the test was based on markers not the actual gene did have a potential 'risk' in not being accurate. But then how many years have people relied on the tobiano test that was based on markers, without question? (it was tobiano, right, not frame? I'm having to change mental gears too much today between criminal law, family law and equine genetics!!!)

Daylene Alford Mon, 12/12/2011 - 21:10

Swing, you may repost it and yes the roan and dun tests are both marker tests.

I should probably add that the chance of error is why UC Davis markets these tests as zygosity tests and prefer to have sire and dam samples to verify.

NZ, yes it was Tobiano that was a marker test for years before there was a test for the actual mutation.

Threnody Mon, 12/12/2011 - 23:12

Odd. They found the markers first but I'm confused as to why it would only be the marker test when the single gene mutation that causes LP has been found and isolated.

From what I've read all of the horses tested with the marker test all had the same markers regardless of breed and background. So it's likely extremely accurate even for a marker test.