The
single cream gene, which dilutes red pigment but not black,
gives a tan-bodied horse with black points. The body color
can range from a pale almost-white cream color, to a deep
chocolate or almost red body. Some buckskins can be almost
mistaken for bays, like the Morgan stallion Blacksaddle Starbuck
at the right, who looks like a dappled bay but is a buckskin
because he has produced double-dilute foals. He is owned by
Chris Holm of Devine
Morgans.
Buckskin is often
confused with dun, a dilute which can be almost identical to dun.
A dun, however, will have a dorsal stripe and other "dun factors"
that distinguish it from a regular buckskin. Sometimes
the mane or tail will have 'frosting', where the outer hairs are diluted
like the body color. This looks similar to the frosting in duns; however,
the two color are caused by different genes.
Buckskin horses
were thought to be tough and hardy by cowboys-- a saying says "you
can't kill a buckskin". Buckskins were-- and are-- considered
flashy or showy colored horses for showing.
Buckskins are
heterozygous (one cream gene, not two) so do not breed true-- meaning
that buckskin X buckskin will not always yeild buckskin (in fact,
it can yeild a variety of color-- chestnut, bay, black, buckskin,
palomino, smoky black, cremello, perlino).
Very light buckskins
are often called Buttermilk Buckskin; Darker golden buckskins are
called Golden Buckskin
The genetic makeup of a buckskin
is E?A?Crcr, the ?'s standing for either dominant or recessive form;
it depends on the horse-- can be either "E" or "e"
in the first case, or "A" or "a" in the second--
either way the horse will be a buckskin.
