Color

We question whether the value of trying to breed for a white body outweighs the value of instant dark pigment in a colored boer. We recently had a doe have twin buck kids. One was a paint and one was traditional. They are pictured here at two days old. We have close pictures of the tail pigment on each one. The white body buck has some small pigment spots that will eventually spread to most if not all of the tail area. The colored buck kid was born with 100% dark pigment.

Pigment is a requirement in the Boer standards and required at least 75% pigment on all of the hairless areas of the body. The reason for the standard requirement is to protect the animal from skin cancer. It is a cull factor if the animal does not have sufficient dark pigment to protect the animal from the sun rays.

Where is the value of the standard to prefer a white body? I attended an ABGA judges class taught by two South African breeders. They stated that the South African breeders could have selected any color but decided upon a white body. They said it could be justified by allowing the breeders to better spot the animals in the hills when rounding them up. Another justification can be the white color reflects the sun rays in the hot, desert areas where the Boers were developed. However, they required the head be red to give a better opportunity for the hairless areas on the head to have dark pigment.

If it was important to have the head be red to help provide dark pigment on the hairless areas, why isn't it just as valuable to have a colored body to go with the colored head and immediately at birth, provide 100% pigment? There is no answer for that standard question other than that was not the way the original South African Boer standards were developed. Some breeders demand the traditional white body and red head Boer goat still and that is perfectly ok but that standard can not be justified by any reason other than it is the look they wanted.

We believe it is much more important to get the 100% dark pigment at birth and have the new kids completely protected. We have had traditional colored animals come down with skin cancer. Even after treating it, some times it came back again. This has never occurred with a colored Boer, solid red or paint. If the tail is red the pigment is dark and 100% coverage....FACT.

The other issue is related to how dark the pigment has to be to be considered ok by the standards. Some traditional animals will have a very light colored pigment but the association will accept any shade of pigment as long as the skin is not pink. There has been no research showing that very light colored pigment is good enough to protect against skin cancer or if it is just as good as the dark pigment. It is a fact that an animal with at least a colored tail will have dark pigment. We believe that the greater the color genetics are in the animal, the better the pigment protection will be against skin cancer.

We don't have to worry about that because we prefer to have the dark pigment at birth. With new born kids that have only small pigment spots at birth, they will be exposed to the sun rays at the worst time because the skin is very tender and sensitive at that stage just like a human baby.

The standards for color can not be justified. I wrote a letter to the ABGA board recently about the Ennoblement program and below is a piece of that letter relating to the color criteria in the Ennoblement program and why it should be changed.

No Justification for Non-traditional color definition

The problem with assigning a traditional or non-traditional classification is based upon standards definitions that have no justification for why they were selected or any financial or health justification for many of them. Nothing should be put into a standard unless it can be justified. Below are the color criteria for a traditional animal. Following each of them, are some comments.

� �A minimum requirement for head color requires a patch of red 13 square inches or approximately the area of a 4 inch diameter circle on both sides of head excluding the ears.� The question is why is �13 square inches� the correct number? If the problem of potential skin cancer is with the hairless areas, why does the head need at least 13 square inches of red color but the body can have no more than 13 square inches? If the color is good for the head, why is it bad for the body?

� �Both ears, at least 75% red coloring.� If coloration on the ears is good, why is only 75% colored acceptable? If 75% is acceptable, why isn�t 60% or 50% acceptable?

� �The red coloring may extend from the nose to the heart girth and no lower than an imaginary line extending from the flank to the breast bone.� Why is it ok for the color to go from the nose all the way down to the imaginary line to the breast bone but it is not good for it to continue to go another 3 inches down the leg?

� �One patch, not exceeding 13 square inches or approximately the area of a 4 inch diameter circle, is permissible on the barrel, hindquarter or belly.� What is the difference between one patch not exceeding 13 square inches or two different patches that are only 6 square inches each? The two smaller patches have less color than the one that is acceptable.

� �Patches of red on the legs may not exceed 3 square inches or approximately the area of a 2 inch diameter circle.� Does that mean EACH leg can have 3 square inches or the sum of all legs can't exceed 3 square inches? Why is it all four legs can�t have as much color as either the head or the body? Why is it bad for an animal to have one leg with 4 square inches of color but it is ok for another animal to have four legs each with 3 square inches of color.

� �Very few red hairs are permissible at 12 months of age or younger� How many red hairs are �very few�? Does that mean 15, 100, 300 red hairs are ok? Does the �very few red hairs� include hair on just the body or are the head and legs also counted? If there are acceptable red areas on the animals, how far away from the acceptable areas do you start counting the unacceptable red hairs? What if the animal has no red areas on their body and legs but has noticeable red hairs sprinkled across the body and legs? Why is it ok for there to be enough red hairs on the body to create a 4 inch in diameter circle but it is un acceptable to take the same amount of red hairs and just sprinkle them over the body? Are judges required to count the red hairs to determine if there are very few on the animal? Why is it ok for an animal to have many red hairs after the age of 12 months? If an animal has more than "very few red hairs" and has a visual inspection done at 12 months old, the animal will be classified as "non-traditional". However, if the breeder waits one more day past 12 months of age, the animal will be classified as "traditional" even though there are the same number of red hairs. Where is the logic in that?