Question About Heterochromia

[Devia Morgenstern]

I wasn't sure where else to put this sooo...
But hypothetically speaking, suppose I have a cat with heterochromia, they have one blue eye and one gold eye let's say, and I breed them to a cat with one color in both eyes-green.
Will the kittens end up with green eyes, or blue eyes, or is it possible some will have gold eyes?
Now what if the heterochromic cat had one green eye, and one gold eye, and I bred them to a cat with blue eyes. What eye colors would the kittens inherit?
Just something that's been on my mind haha.

 

[gitabooks]

I love color genetics in cats! Honestly, I have no idea what you would get from these mixes though

It would depend on modifier genes as well as whether the eye colors were dominant, codominant, incomplete dominant, or recessive.

Blue eyes in Siamese-type (Color Point) cats are actually due to a form of albinism which is usually recessive. Albinisim doesn't usually lead to odd-eye colors. Odd-eyed cats are probably some form of Dominant White or Dominant White Spot. There is a very rare gene that can lead to blue eyes in normally pigmented cats but I think it is associated with health problems due to inbreeding.

Speaking of health problems, blue eyes in a white cat are associated with deafness. If one eye is blue and the other isn't then sometimes the ear above the blue eye will be deaf but the other ear will be normal. This is why in general I'm against the breeding of blue-eyed white cats, since not only can hearing impairments affect their life but blue eyes are extremely sensitive to bright light.
I think odd-eyed white cats usually have "Dominant Spot" as their main gene? But the distribution of pigmentation can be fairly random (similar to merle dogs, which also can have pigment-related deafness). So I don't know if you could always determine if the eye would be blue or not.

Fun genetics question though! : )

 

[lokipepperlove]

it would vary some kittens would have blue some would have green and some would have gold