Colors of the Turanian Horse: Sabino

Colors of the Turanian Horse

And its Descendants:

Sabino

Sabino is a pattern, rather than a color, and it can occur in conjunction with any color, and with grey. In its most usual manifestation, sabino is seen as three or four white stockings, sometimes reaching over the knees or hocks, and a blaze and chin marking, or star and snip; very often there are one or more white spots on the belly or chest. When more fully expressed, a roanlike sprinkling of white hairs shows up throughout the coat. In its greatest exaggeration, sabino produces a lacy Pinto who may be nearly white. Sabino is found in every variety of the Oriental Hotblood.

The type of Sabino usually seen is that shown on the Caspian above left. Note the high white stockings, which either reach or pass the knee, the wide blaze, the chin marking which reaches up the lower jaws, and the flecks of white which are probably the extension of a white spot on the belly. All these marks taken in combination are diagnostic of Sabino. (See also the Palomino horse in the section on Bend Or spots for typical Sabino markings.)

Sabino is a dominant trait; and there is some reason to believe that a homozygous Sabino will have more "chrome" than a heterozygote. The extent of a Sabino's stockings, blaze and any body spotting are usually controlled by polygenes whose exact function is not fully understood, but there does seem to be some control exercised by alleles at the Bay/Not Bay locus as well. A horse which is Bay, or which carries Bay (as in the usual Dun or Buckskin colorations) will typically have somewhat muted Sabino markings; sometimes limited to three or four white pasterns and a star or star and snip. Curiously, in Akhal-Tekes, Raven Black does not seem to curtail the extent of Sabino markings, and there are many examples of exquisite Raven Black Sabinos, including Akhal-Teke stallion Azal (right).

Another common feature of Sabino is the tendency for white hairs to be sprinkled throughout the coat. Sometimes there are only a few white hairs, scattered more or less evenly, and sometimes white hairs clump in what looks like roaned spots. Sometimes these areas of white hairs may be so profuse that the horse appears to be marked with lacy white splotches, as in the Thoroughbred stallion Puchilingui, some of whose offspring are nearly white.