Lipizzaner Horse's White Coat

Photo: Lipizzaner Stallion. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

Ever wonder about the Lipizzaner's white coat?

A new study published Sunday in the scientific journal Nature Genetics solves a decades-old mystery over the white colouring of the Lipizzaner horses. The distinctive white colouring of these famous horses performing at Vienna's prestigious Spanish riding school is caused by a mutated gene.

White and grey horses, including Lipizzaners, are born darker but lose their colour between the age of six and eight due to chromosome mutations, according to Austrian and Swedish researchers for this study.

These genetic changes cause pigment-producing melanocyte cells to be produced more rapidly in these horses so that the stock is quickly used up and the horses lose their pigmentation.

There, simple as that !!!

» Source: The Vancouver Sun