My new little girl

[Nightingale 0]

I'd never thought about it, but most of the red cats I've seen have been male, so I googled it to find out why:

The red gene is sex linked and exists only on the female (X) chromosome. This is a gene with symbol O and is probably the most interesting gene affecting cat color/pattern from a genetic point of view.

Its effect is to replace all the eumelanin in the growing hairs with phaeomelanin. I.e, the hairs exhibit red-based rather than black-based colors.

What makes it more interesting though is that:

1. The O gene is sex-linked on the X chromosome, and
2. In the heterozygote (female - Oo), it causes the Tortoiseshell pattern. So male cats are either O (red) or o (black), whereas females can be OO (red), Oo (tortoiseshell) or oo (black). [for simplicity we are ignoring rare cases of tortie males - these result from abnormal construction of the sex chromosomes].

There's also another gene that is dominant white, which overrides all the other color genes, producing a pure white cat.
http://www.tenset.co.uk/catgen/indexus.html

So, it looks like female red cats are rarer simply because there are 3 possible colors from that O gene, rather than just the 2 possibilities for male cats, unless the male cat has three sex chromosomes (XXY) instead of 2 (XY), giving it the same color options as a female.

[Elisha 1]

I saw something like this yesterday when I googled as well, but was disappointed that it didn't give any approximate numbers. I saw something about male calicos like 1 in 5000 (because of the mutation with the "bonus" X chromosome), but nothing for ratio of female orange tabby's. They seem to be more common in comparison since I guess they're "legit" (unlike male calicos), but still not that likely to happen. Where's the numbers people?!?

[pBASEtobe 0]

Hmm...interesting, thanks!

I've never seen a male Calico.

[Nightingale 0]

Aside from doing genetic testing on every cat out there, because of dominant and recessive genes, there's really no way to know just by looking at the cat.

Example: red gene
Female calico: XO Xo
Male orange: XO Y
So, in that case, you'd have a 1/4 chance of getting a female orange, who'd be XX OO.

Then, you have to factor in the Tabby gene, which is dominant.
Female Tabby (either AA or Aa)
Male Tabby (Either AA or Aa)
if one or both parents are AA, you have 100% chance of getting a tabby. However, if they're Aa, you have a 75% chance of getting a tabby, and a 25% chance of getting a solid cat.

Then, if one of the parents happens to be white, it's probably a dominant white gene (albinos are very rare, but look similar), so then you have to factor in a Ww or WW gene combination too, because white will override any other color gene, whether or not the cat is carrying the red gene. If one parent is Ww and the other is ww, then you have a 50% chance of getting a white cat instead of an orange. If both parents are Ww, you have a 75% chance of getting a white cat.

So, we can tell that Dave's kitten is: XX OO ww and either Aa or AA, because she's female (XX), red (OO), not white (ww) and tabby (Aa or AA, because A is dominant).

[Elisha 1]

I was just thinking of basic proportions, e.g. 5 out of every 100 orange tabbys are female, based on a random sample (a TURE random sample and not adverse selection, bias, etc.) so one could get an idea of liklihood of a female orange tabby. This is considering that I saw some site that mentioned 1 out of 5000 or something for a male calico (i.e. out of 5000 calicos, 4999 will be female).

[gmittar 0]

My siamese Sky.

|>.<|
Seriously, W.T.F. mate?

[Nightingale 0]

After searching google for half an hour, all I could find was the genetic stuff listed above.

[Elisha 1]

Nice....looks funny with the blue nail caps.

[gmittar 0]

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Nice....looks funny with the blue nail caps.

I took that picture with the nails in mind, but it turned out as a cool shot of him anyway.

|>.<|
Seriously, W.T.F. mate?

[Squeak 17]

that's the bewst pic of you I've seen yet Dave

You are not now, nor will you ever be, good enough to not die in this sport (Sparky)
My Life ROCKS!
How's yours doing?

[waltappel 1]

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My siamese Sky.

What a gorgeous kitty!

Walt

[vid666 0]

since you all showes me (us) your pussy

here's mine.

she liked to walk all over the lines when I pack in the living room. She also LOVES to play with the bridle.

Could never get her to be a packing weight though - she is only 7lbs :)

[vid666 0]

and of course a "portrait" :)

[waltappel 1]

That is a truly adorable kitty!

Walt

[sundevil777 102]

My cats look like some others posted here...

People are sick and tired of being told that ordinary and decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I’m certainly not, and I’m sick and tired of being told that I am

[waltappel 1]

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My cats look like some others posted here...

They do!

Walt

[SpeedRacer 1]

your cat is a little princess.

Speed Racer
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[Elisha 1]

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My cats look like some others posted here...

They do!

Walt

Those upside down pics of cats are funny. When I first got my rig and was changing the risers, I had to shut my cat in the bedroom. Squirting him every 30 seconds in the living room to keep him from playing with the chute just got tiresome quickly.