Michael J Byrne
Llamas come in a wide range of coat colours and patterns. The inheritance of these characteristics is poorly understood and it is a brave person who would bet money on the colour of the next llama cria born on the farm. Alpaca breeders have improved their odds of prediction by favouring solid coloured animals and by breeding like to like over several generations. With llamas, however, there has been less emphasis on breeding to produce a reproducible coat and the outcome of most matings, from the coat colour perspective, is pot luck. Although the range of colour and coat patterns in llamas is large it is not unlimited and a good way to begin is to try to define and describe the colours and patterns we commonly see. What exists and what doesn't.
It is important to try to keep colour and pattern separate in one's thinking . Black is a colour but appaloosa is a pattern. If you say "My llama is an appaloosa", you describe the general pattern of distribution of coat colour , but not the colour.
Colour:
The range of coat colours of llamas is similar to that seen in other large herbivores. White, cream, black through shades of grey, browns and various shades of red is the spectrum. The same colours if not the exact shades are seen in the horse or in the range of domestic cattle. There may be turquoise parrots but there are no turquoise llamas.
There are difficulties with describing colour in llamas.
First there is no agreed set of descriptive terms for the various shades particularly in the red range. This can be addressed to some degree by the use of colour charts such as that produced by the Alpaca Association of Australia for categorising the colours seen in these camelids. The range of 22 colours on this chart is not, however, sufficient for llamas. In addition the grey of grey alpacas is not the same as the mouse colour seen in llamas .
A second difficulty is that llama wool is often different in colour at the end of the fibre compared to the colour at the base making the superficial appearance of the animal a different colour to that close to the skin.
A third difficulty is that the shade of colour alters often quite significantly as a cria progresses through the first 6 months of life and additionally the colour of the second fleece may vary significantly from that of the adult fleece.
These are not insurmountable problems, however, and the development of a llama-specific colour chart and registration which allowed the characterisation of an animal's colour provisionally at birth then definitively at 12 months would significantly assist agreement and consistency in describing and categorising coat colour.
What of pattern.
Pattern:
The pattern of colour distribution in the llama is quite complex especially in respect of the minor colours seen around the head and lower legs of some multicoloured individuals. The following simple description is useful as a framework for classification.
Solids
A solid coloured animal is one in which all the coat, hair and wool, is of the same colour. While the shade of the colour of the hair on the head may be slightly different from that of the wool on the body, perhaps due to weathering of the former, they must be the same colour. An animal with a grey head and a dilute red body coat is not a solid coloured animal even though it may not have any white on it.
Solid blacks, solid browns, solid reds all occur. In fact any colour or shade which occurs in the llama would seem able to be present in a solid pattern.
Bay
Bay is a description of a coat colour pattern applied to a horse which is red in colour on the body, neck and upper legs but which has a black coat on the ears and the lower legs, the points. There are llamas which have a similar coat colour pattern. In general the extent of the black in the llama is greater than is seen in a bay horse and often involves the whole of the head and ears and may partly involve the tail. Whether this pattern is strictly analogous to bay in the horse is uncertain, but it is simply described as such and is a reasonably common pattern in North American llamas. The intensity of colour in bay llamas varies considerably. At one end of a spectrum one sees a deep red coloured body and black on head and lower legs while at the other a dilute light mouse grey points and a pale fawn body.
Occasionally one sees an animal in which the red on the body extends on to the face and cheeks and ears and the black pigment is confined to the area around the eyes. It is uncertain whether this is a bay pattern of limited extent or whether it constitutes a different pattern altogether.
Patched or paint
In many animals areas of solid colour are broken up by limited, on in some cases, extensive areas of white on the body, neck , face or legs. It is likely that at least one way in which an animal can appear completely white in coat colour while retaining good pigment around eye rims and on the nose is by having very extensive patching of this sort. White animals with very small isolated areas of pigment probably represent the penultimate step in this process. Patching may overlie other basic patterns, so that a bay animal may have a white patch on the body but it will be possible to distinguish the fundamental bay pattern on head and legs.
Appaloosa
An appaloosa is a horse the unique characteristic of which is a striking though rather varied spotted coat. Some llamas have a spotted coat pattern which is similar to that seen in some appaloosas. The most common pattern is one in which the entire body is a light or dilute red with the spots of a deeper red or light brown. Light grey background with darker grey spots may also be seen. As appaloosas develop longer coats with maturity, it is often difficult to discern the spotted nature of the pigmentation so that some very dilute appaloosas appear as an almost uniform cream colour on the body. The spotted nature of their coat pattern can better be seen when the llama is shorn.
Self coloured / Agouti
The pattern of distribution of colour seen in wild camelids, the guanaco and the vicunia is also seen in some llamas. Wild camelids are usually light fawn to dun coloured on the upper part of the body neck and outer aspects of the upper portions of the front and rear legs. On the belly, breast, inner front legs and thighs the colour becomes paler tending toward cream and this extends between the thighs around the perianal region. On the head and ears the dun colour may tone to a very soft grey which is also present on the front of the lower legs. This distribution of pigment sometimes with light grey or dark grey rather than dun as the dominant colour is not infrequently seen particularly on short woolled animals.
Calico / Tortoise Shell
These llamas have both black and red anywhere on the neck and/or the body. They differ from Bays in that Bays are red on the body and only have black on the legs, head and occasionally the tail.
Calico llamas may have deep rich pigment in which case the red is a deep colour and the black is black. The colours may also be affected by genes which produce a dilution of the colours in which case the red may be a light fawn and the black diluted to a light grey.
The characteristic feature, however, is the distribution of the pigment. The red and black fibres may be intimately intermingled producing a roaned effect in some areas while in others patches of red and black may be sharply defined. When the llama also has areas of white on the neck or body the adjacent red and black areas are often well defined.
In cats the calico or tortoise shell pattern is sex linked. Calico cats are always female. This is not so in llamas where calico animals of either sex occur.
The manner in which the various colours and coat colour patterns is inherited in the llama has not been satisfactorily determined.
Some have applied to llamas the system of genetic nomenclature commonly employed in interpreting colour and colour distribution in the horse. The data on coat colour documented in horse stud records extending back over many generations has allowed the utility of this system to be established and refined over time so that now it can be used with confidence to predict the colour of foals. Llama coat colour and pattern ,however, has not been extensively or rigorously documented and there are few data on which to base any analyses. The example of the calico pattern, where clearly the method of inheritance is different in llamas from that in cats indicates that direct transference of concepts of inheritance from one species to another may be invalid. Much more data must be accumulated before definitive statements can be made.
The establishment of llama registries which document the breeding as well as the coat colour and pattern of llamas is one of ways in which a sufficient data base to tackle this problem can be established.
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