Horse Color Explored ― Over 160 Breeds, Types and Variations Explained

Horse Color Explored is an up-to-date reference demystifying horse coat colors, patterns, and markings. Beginning with a clear explanation of basic genetics author Vera Kurskaya quickly moves to the main theories of horse color inheritance. 168 color photos guide the reader through basic colors followed by diluted colorsthe cream, dun, and silver genes, and rarer colors such as champagnes, pearls, and flaxen. White patterning is covered extensively, which defines the markings for such breeds as American Paint Horses and Appaloosas. Common head and leg markings are joined by intriguingly named, less common ones such as tetrarch spots, bird catcher’s ticking, and bloody shoulder. The book concludes with seven handy appendices encompassing colors specific to particular breeds, equine hybrid colors, and a case study on how to calculate horse color inheritance, among other indispensable knowledge for horse owners, breeders, and enthusiasts.

Vera Kurskaya discovered horses as a teenager, but at the age of 20, an injury forced her to give up riding. Horses have never left Kurskaya’s life, however. She has degrees in law (2006) and in Russian language and literature (2010), and worked as a freelance journalist for the popular Russian equestrian magazines Konnyi Mir (“The Horse World”), “My Horse,” and “Alpha Kentavra,” eventually serving as editor at Konnyi Mir in 2010. Horse color was always one of Kurskaya’s greatest interests, beginning as a hobby and evolving into professional study of horse color genetics, as she first wrote articles online and in print magazines, and eventually published a book (“Horse Colors”) in Russian. In 2013 Kurskaya began researching the Silver gene in horse breeds originating in Russia and the countries of the former Soviet Union, and soon discovered it in Soviet Draft and Byelorussian Harness breeds. Today Kurskaya is a lecturer of social sciences at the Moscow State University of Railway Engineering and a post-graduate student at the Russian State Agrarian University. She is finishing her doctoral thesis in biology concerning horse colors, continues to research the Silver gene, advises as a consultant in Dun gene research in Russian Don and Budyonny breeds, and is working on her second book on horse genetics. She lives in Moscow.