THE INHERITANCE OF COAT COLOR IN HORSES 



PROFESSOR W. S. ANDERSON 

 Kentucky Weslkyax Collkck. Winch kstkr, Ky. 



In May, 1912, I published a paper on "The Inheritance 

 of Coat Color in Horses." It was based on a study of the 

 American saddle horse. I knew at the time of my investi- 

 gation that A. H. Sturtevant, of Columbia University, 

 N. Y., had in the hands of the printer a manuscript which 

 gave a summary of all papers published to date on the 

 subject. It was my agreement with him, made at Cold 

 Spring Harbor, N. Y., in 1911, that when his paper was 

 published I was to draw on its material for another sum- 

 mary of the problem involved. Sturtevant 's paper, "A 

 Critical Examination of Recent Studies on Colour In- 

 heritance in Horses," was published in the Journal of 

 Genetics, Vol. II, No. 1, Cambridge, England. 



Sturtevant had published, August, 1910, in the Bio- 

 logical Bullet in, his study of the "Inheritance of Color 

 in the American Harness Horse." Hurst, of England, 

 had based his conclusions on a study of the English 

 thoroughbreds. Wilson had tabulated the color of the 

 Shire, Clydesdale and thoroughbreds ; while Harper had 

 given his attention to the French percherons. To these 

 five breeds I am now able to add the records of the saddle 

 horse. It is my purpose to combine the figures and draw 

 some conclusions from them. 



My apology, if one be necessary, for devoting so much 

 time to the color of the horse is, that this is only a part 

 of a larger study, the determination of the unit charac- 

 ters of the horse. I hold that we can make poor progress 

 in this larger work until we have solved the most obvious 

 ones of these characters. If there is a law governing the 

 transmission of color, may we not infer that a law of 

 somewhat like nature will govern the transmission of the 

 more essential qualities of the horse? If it can be proved 



