Cat Genetics

A resource for all of your (kitty) coat genetic questions!

[catgenetics]

Hi so I'm trying to come up with an AU where Firestart is Pinestarts grandkid. I'm really liking the idea of Firestars mom being something like a Tortishell Maine Coon and Jake being a Somali or Abyssian. How would Firestar look like with them as parents? Would something like a Ticked Somaly or Abyssian be possible?

Hi!

Somalis and Abyssinians have that distinct color and pattern from two sets of polygenes - one set controls the amount of striping on the legs, neck, and tail, and the other is our good friend the rufousing (redness) polygenes.

Somalis and Abyssinians are bred to have as little striping and as high rufousing as possible. Crosses of these breeds will generally have the leg, tail and neck striping - though maybe not as much as a moggy, and rufousing that is higher than average, but not as high as the intense red undercoat of Somalis and Abys.

You can get around that second bit somewhat. by having Nutmeg have pretty high rufousing, like this.

That’ll give Firestar a better chance for even higher rufousing, though he’d still probably be at the low end of the Abyssinian range, something like this. Whether that’s Fire- material is up for you to decide.

[catgenetics]

I cannot imagine how many different possibilities there could be, but what are the most likely parents of an orange tabby tom w/ a white belly? I’m not sure how difficult of a question this is sksksk

You’re right, there is a lot of possibilities. But the mother could be ginger or tortoiseshell, dilute or full-color. And one of the parents will have to carry white. If the cat is genetically tabby, then at least one parent has to carry tabby, but if he’s not, then he’ll still have tabby stripes, just not breed for it.

I hope that helped!

[catgenetics]

This is my new baby.

I'm pretty sure he's a cream spotted tabby with white spotting (yellow eyes). Did I get him right?

///

He looks more ginger than cream to me but that could be the lighting. But yeah, sounds right!

[catgenetics]

do you know if the cat breeding on the sims 3 pets will produce accurate-looking kits?

It absolutely will not.

Signed mod Lion that has been trying to breed a certain color of cat for literal ages on Sims 3

[sparrowminder]

do you know anything abouit lykoi genetics? i have no idea how to figure out what their kits would look like

It’s a single recessive gene, so unless they’re breeding to another Lykoi or a cat with Lykoi ancestry, the kittens will not have the mutation.

[catgenetics]

What would their kittens look like? Dad: black and white Turkish Van pattern with amber eyes and long fur. Mom: chocolate ticked tabby with green eyes.

All kittens would have white. If dad carries chocolate, kittens could be black or chocolate, or the dilute versions of that if both parents carry dilute. They’d probably be ticked tabbies, unless mom carried another type of tabby or solid. They could only be longhaired if mom carries the longhair gene.

I hope that helped!

[catgenetics]

Hi, I just sent in the other question. When you said grey ticked tabby, did you mean silver? Because I'm having trouble specifically finding ticked tabbies that say they're grey. I keep seeing silver ticked tabbies and was wondering if they are the same as grey or are different.

Silver and gray are two separate things. Gray is the dilution of black. Silver is a sort of “inhibitor” gene. It changes the hairs a bit and makes the cat look different.

(I’m not too knowledgable about the silver gene, so Sparrow or Lion, feel free to edit/correct me/add on) 

[catgenetics]

Father: classic cinnamon tabby with black stripes and 50% white spotting. Mother: a blond mackerel tabby with no white spotting?

First of all, cats cannot be cinnamon with black stripes. He can either be a cinnamon classic tabby or a black classic tabby.

And cats cannot be blond. They can be cream or red.

I’m going to assume you meant a cream mackerel tabby and a cinnamon classic tabby.

Girls would be tortoiseshells, either dilute or full-color. Boys would be red or cream. If mom carries classic, they kittens could be mackerel or classic tabbies. If dad has high white spotting, they’ll each have a bit of white. If he has low, it’ll be passed on to about half of the offspring. If they’re both longhaired, then the kittens will be longhaired.

I hope this helped!

[catgenetics]

Their kits? mom: Cinnamon Ticked Tabby/green eyes/long fur Dad: grey/yellow eyes/not a purebred of any type/mixed lines/has an oriental type build but very subtle

If Dad carries cinnamon, kits could be cinnamon, fawn, black or gray. They could be ticked tabbies, or another type of tabby if Mom carries it. And if Dad carries longhaired, then the kits can be longhaired too.

I hope this helps!

[catgenetics]

Trying to figure out what their kits would look like. Mom: Siamese/Chocolate/point/blue eyes/ Dad: Abyssinian/Cinnamon with black as undercoat/ ticking/ green eyes (if possible). Sorry i'm a beginner at cat genetics, hopefully I did it right.

Ok, I can help you out! One note though - I assume by “cinnamon with black as undercoat” you mean cinnamon carrying black, but black is dominant, which means this is impossible. I’ll treat the father as a normal cinnamon aby.

If these are both purebred cats, we would expect that the father does not carry pointing, and is homozygous for ticked tabby. Cinnamon is accepted in Siamese cats, so the mother could potentially carry Siamese.

This means we can expect the kittens to be chocolate or cinnamon ticked tabby. They might have some tabby stripes on the legs, tail, and neck, but probably less then a random-bred ticked tabby would have. Eye color could be anything except blue, since the blue eyes in Siamese are caused by the colorpoint pattern.

[catgenetics]

Here’s a photo of the spot! It’s a bit lighter in person, but this is the highest quality photo I have on hand.

[catgenetics]

What controls what color the inner ear of a cat would be?

The fur color around it. Same as the nose.

[catgenetics]

Hi, my family recently adopted two 5-month-old kittens. The girl (Clover) is a cream tabby with a some white spotting, but she's got this little dark gray spot on the side of her neck. Maybe an inch long at most? There doesn't seem to be any gray anywhere else on her body. I'm wondering what might cause this besides her being a chimera?

It is possible that she is a calico, it would be very unlikely that no other grey would show, but it is possible.

Other than that, as far as I know, they only other explanation would be a chimera, however I feel as though that is way more unlikely then the former.

It’s possible that any other grey spots are hidden by the white spotting.

You could submit a picture of the spot, if you like, it would be interesting to see

[catgenetics]

Somatic mutation!! It could be a random mutation in a single cell early on, that then divided to become a small patch. These are also uncommon but not nearly as uncommon as chimeras.

-Sparrow

[catgenetics]

A black female and a brown classic tabby male with white markings?

I'm going to assume by "brown" you mean black but feel free to correct me if I'm assuming wrong.

Kittens will all be black, some will have classic Tabby (or whichever tabby that mom carries, if any).

Kits will have no more white then dad does, some won't have any

[catgenetics]

Hi, my family recently adopted two 5-month-old kittens. The girl (Clover) is a cream tabby with a some white spotting, but she's got this little dark gray spot on the side of her neck. Maybe an inch long at most? There doesn't seem to be any gray anywhere else on her body. I'm wondering what might cause this besides her being a chimera?

It is possible that she is a calico, it would be very unlikely that no other grey would show, but it is possible.

Other than that, as far as I know, they only other explanation would be a chimera, however I feel as though that is way more unlikely then the former.

It's possible that any other grey spots are hidden by the white spotting.

You could submit a picture of the spot, if you like, it would be interesting to see

[catgenetics]

Ginger ticked tabby male and a cream classic tabby female?

If the male carries dilute, then the kittens can be cream. If the male carries classic tabby, then the kittens can be classic tabbies.

[catgenetics]

What kind of kittens would come from a red somali and a cream classic tabby? Thank you.

All kittens would be red ticked tabbies, since I believe Somalis are TaTa. Please correct if I’m wrong fellow mods. I don’t think a purebred Somali would carry dilute either, so they’d all be red ticked tabbies.