Perlino
Perlino is a bay-based coat with two copies of the cream gene. This results in a very pale cream coat, similar to cremello, but the mane and tail are often slightly darker with a warm beige or golden tint. Horses with two cream copies are often called double cream horses.
Looks Like (Phenotype)
A perlino horse looks almost white from a distance, but the coat has a soft creamy shade. The mane and tail are usually a slightly deeper cream or warm beige with a reddish tint, rather than pure white. The skin is pink and the eyes are light blue.
Double cream horses are difficult to distinguish from each other. Genetic testing is the most reliable method.
Variations
The warm shading in the mane and tail may be:
- Very subtle in some horses
- More noticeable in others, especially in sunlight
Note: When a bay-based coat has two copies of the cream-allele, the different bay variations (such as wild bay and seal brown) become visually indistinguishable. Once a horse is perlino, you cannot tell which shade of bay it originally was. Since there is no genetic test available for these bay variations (yet), the underlying base colour cannot be confirmed at the time of writing.
Behind the Colour (Genotype)
Two copies of the cream gene fully lighten the coat, but the bay base gives the mane and tail slightly more colour than cremello. However, genetic testing is still the most reliable method here.