You've always had a dream of breeding your mare and raising a foal. You have bred your mare to the stallion of your dreams, you waited 11 months for her to foal, and after many nights of no sleep wondering when the magic time will come you, well ok your mare , delivers a healthy baby. The foal is the spitting image of dad with just the right stuff from mom thrown in, just what you wanted except there is still one question, what color is it?You might know what color it "appears" to be but what color will it really be when grown? What color do you register it as? It is pretty important to get the correct color of your horse on it's papers. It aids not only in correct identification but also in the future prospects of foal production if you or someone else decides to breed it. This is a question that in the Andalusian and American Azteca horses particularly, can cause a lot of thought and sometimes guessing for even the most serious of breeders. Lets cover some general rules, and a few scenarios of the most common colors and how they progress. Foals a not usually born the color they will be when grown up. Some of this is due to nature which provides new foals with camouflage needed to keep them hidden from predators. I guess horses still haven't been totally convinced that mountain lions and wolves don't come in warm barns and stalls. In the wild herds often though, that is a concern and nature has provided a way to hide some of the babies from being spotted by a hungry lion or coyote. Foals are often born dull colors or colors that have a natural way of blending into their environment. Primitive markings are commonly seen on foals but disappear later in life, like striping on the legs shoulders and back. Though in the Quarter Horse today, those markings would be considered dun, they are not duns, in some of the cases I have seen with Andalusians and sometimes American Aztecas. Remember the Andalusian is a very old breed dating back to the times that the primitive markings like those of the Przewalski and the Sorria were often found on horses. The Quarter Horse having those same markings would very likely be a dun, carrying the dun factor and would keep those markings for life. Often though, they disappear from Andalusian Azteca foals when they get a little older. They were only camouflage characteristics and they are not duns and are not carrying the dun gene. In order to have a dun foal you must have a dun parent. Some Lusitano's maybe and many Quarter Horses are duns. They do carry the gene so be aware whether or not one of your horses parents was actually a dun when deciding what your foal is. It is advisable to wait until the horse has shed it's foal coat and sometimes it's first winter coat and see if those markings are still there. If they are and you have at least one dun as a parent then you officially have a dun. General rule of thumb, if it is old enough to judge and has a dorsal stripe and leg bars often with shoulder striping and cob webbing on the face, it is a dun. If it has a dorsal stripe only without the other dun factors, that might be a different thing called "counter shade striping" and is not a dun. A couple of other general rules apply to foal coats. Light foals usually darken and foals that are born dark vivid colors in Andalusians and American Aztecas usually turn grey loosing all color as an aged adult. Notice I am saying "general rules" and "usually", there are some exceptions that we may cover in other articles but for the most this is the rule. With 80% of Andalusians being grey, it is a major factor in the offspring and important to determine. Grey foals are usually born dark vivid colors like bay, black, brown, chestnut, even paint/pinto etc... There are several indicators that might help to determine if you have a grey foal. One, look at the colors of the parents. There are three rules that are hard a fast. 1. If even one parent is grey you have a 50 to 100% chance that the foal will turn grey. 2. If neither parent is grey you will not get a grey foal even if some of the grandparents were grey. 3. If one parent is a homozygous grey you have a 100% chance of a grey foal. If both parents are grey, it does mean that your foal will be grey? Not necessarily. You would have to investigate the parents pedigree to get a better idea of what genes they might be able to pass on. You can get a colored foal from two grey parents. With it understood that you must have a grey parent to have a grey foal, look at the foals hair. The first and best indicator is around the eyes and on the face. If your foal has grey hairs , even two or three, around the eyes it WILL turn grey. Now look at it's "born color", within a few days of birth. Are it's legs very dark or black? If so it will probably turn grey. Are it's legs light tan, fawn, grey, smoky? If so it will probably darken. Foals that are going to be dark or bay will usually not be born with black legs. They are usually very light blonde to brownish. No other color will win out over grey. If your foal has inherited a grey gene it is going to grey. It does not matter if it is a loud Paint, a beautiful black or a golden palomino or buckskin. If the grey gene is there it will turn grey. An amazing thing with the Andalusian, is that foals that are going to be black are born mouse grey, dirty brownish, or as the Spanish say "the color of the rat". Foals that are going to be grey are born vivid colors, jet black, bay with black points, dark brown etc. Funny how nature likes to keep us confused or should I say, surprise. If your foal is going to grey, as it gets older you should see more and more grey appearing, starting on the face first. Usually you will know for sure within few months whether or not you have a grey but sometimes they can stay dark for a long time and really keep you in suspense. If that is the case, remember what color it was born and keep watching the face. Grey hairs appearing on the face indicate that the horse will turn grey. Watch the inside of the tail, by the bone. Those are the first areas to grey. I have seen horses 5-6 years old and even older that you would swear were not going to grey but the telltale signs in the face and tail showed that they were. With the introduction of the Quarter Horse to the American Azteca, roan becomes a possibility. So is he grey or roan? For your foal to be roan he must have at least one roan parent. Then again, watch the face. Roans do not usually have white hairs on the face just the body. If your horse has white on it's face it is probably a grey. There are some different types of roan that Andalusians have also. One is called Rabicano. It is found on a solid colored horse and shows with white hairs in the flanks and usually the top of the tail. These can be as little as having roan patches in the udder or sheath area to a large as fanning out from the flank, over the ribs and even having patches elsewhere. Another possibility is called "ticking". Ticking is finding several or many white hairs scattered throughout the body on a solid colored horse. This is why looking for grey hairs on the body or in the flanks is not a good way to tell if a horse will grey. Roan, Rabicano or ticking does not increase significantly with age, although elderly horses often develop more grey hairs because of age. Sort of like we do! There are many colors to cover and we may do so in subsequent articles but for now those might help in determining what color your new horse might be.