Postby Jorge » Sun Oct 10, 2010 4:55 pm
By observing the provided photograph it seems to me that QUESTION DAY possesses the phenotype of a normal gray (G/g) gene carrier and not the appearance of a cropout "Stained White" (which is the only possibility when dealing with correctly registered parents).
Question Day is sporting dark skin and hooves, dark areas around the nostrils, (whitening with age) dark points on the legs and normal dark hairs in his mane. All these indicators betrays a gray horse, period!
When we are in the presence of a cropout "Stained White", the design is quite different from that of a gray and the observer detects it immediately.
The reaction of the observer is that of seeing a "white" equine with a very maculated appearance.
Since it is evident that we are not dealing here with a cropout "Stained White", we have no other reasonable option than to analyze this case from the premise of being a normal "Gray".
I have no evidence to contradict the photograph showing that Question Day's sire was a solid color equine. But I am a little puzzled with the fact that he is coming from the very influential gray lineage of Kendor; a French lineage widely known for stamping gray-ness wherever he goes.
On the other hand, the bottom line of Question Day's pedigree doesn't seem to be the culprit.
Another factor that seems to fuel the argument of a normal gray sire is that the official records seems to be correct all the way back through many generations (upper and bottom halves).
Going back through his dam’s pedigree (King’s Widow) doesn’t seem to support the idea
that she was a gray because you will have to go back seven generations to find a single gray (in this case Native Dancer sire of Dan Cupid).
If there is an error in parentage that's another story and the paradigm changes completely.
In synthesis, unless a real outrageous one-of-a-kind birth occurred here,
I am convinced that Question Day's sire was actually a gray and that the photo of his sire was that of another horse or that he later grayed out completely (doesn’t seem according to that photo).
You be the judge!
