All offspring from traditional coloured mares (black, bay, chestnut) will be buckskin or palomino. If Romeo is bred to a buckskin or a palomino, 50% of the time you get cremello or perlino and 50% of the time you get buckskin or palomino.
You will note the "CR - that indicates that Romeo is homozygous for cream and will always pass the cream gene to offspring.
You will see the capital "A" - homozygous for agouti. This is extremely rare to see "homozygous for agouti" on a double cream dilute - Romeo is homozygous for agouti and will ALWAYS pass the agouti gene on to ALL offspring. Agouti is the gene that restricts the black to the points (legs, mane, tail) and is needed to create buckskin (otherwise they would be smokey black offspring). To date, as far as we know, there are only 3 known double cream dilutes in the Morgan breed that are HOMOZYGOUS for AGOUTI.
So, from traditional coloured mares (bay, black, chestnut), if the offspring has a black gene (the black is automatically restricted to the points by the homozygous agouti) the offspring automatically becomes buckskin. If the offspring has no black (i.e. neither parent contributes any black to the offspring) the offspring automatically becomes palomino....NO SMOKEY BLACK OFFSPRING. All black will be restricted to the points by the homozygous agouti = buckskin.
You will see the Ee on the test results (and this part is REALLY EXCITING) on top of having the cream gene to give every time and the homozygous agouti gene to restrict any black, Romeo also carries one black gene!! The odds are 50/50 he will pass on a black gene to offspring, which will in turn be restricted with the homozygous agouti to the "points" of the offspring creating buckskin!!!! And that is without even factoring in the mares colour contribution to the offspring. Now, "if" the traditional coloured mare can also supply a black gene, you increase the odds of the offspring being buckskin even higher.
If Romeo just had red factor alone, he would be called a cremello. It is the black gene that makes him a perlino and makes him able to pass on a black gene, which you need along with an agouti gene to create buckskins.
What does the agouti do if there is no black in the genetic makeup of the offspring? Well, the agouti just sits there, dormant in the offspring doing nothing since there is no black to restrict.
