Dun is a yellow-brown color, sometimes seen in the hair coats of horses, characterized by a body color ranging from sandy yellow to reddish-brown. Dun horses always have a dark stripe down the middle of their back, which may continue into the tail and mane, and may have darker faces and legs. Binomial name Equus caballus Linnaeus, 1758 The Horse (Equus caballus) is a sizeable ungulate mammal, one of the seven modern species of the genus Equus. ...
Buckskin horses look very similar to duns, but lack the stripe down their backs. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, buckskin and dun colorations are actually caused by two completely different genes. Buckskin is a color of horses; it also refers to other things that are the color of a buckskin horse, such as the color of some breeds of dogs. ... This stylistic schematic diagram shows a gene in relation to the double helix structure of DNA and to a chromosome (right). ...
But dun mane and tail frosting is diluted to a shade that is generally very similar to the color of the dun diluted body of the particular horse, rather than white like the frosting on a buckskin.
The dunhorse's coat must be diluted to an appropriate color corresponding with the effects of the dun dilute gene on that particular base coat color.
It seems that the color of dun markings is directly related to the base color (the horse'scolor if not diluted by a dungene) in that specific area where the particular dun marking is located.