Brown Tabby or ??

[mrsacolby]

I have two kittens which I thought were Brown Tabby but wondering if maybe there is more to it. As their color has come out it seems that they have orange striping in their face and shoulder area. Included a pic of mom too.

 

[Furballsmom]

Mom is lovely - I think I'm seeing a little calico coloring there?

 

[StefanZ]

WHOM is the momma?

Brown tabbies do have often a warm brownish color. Sometimes there is even rufism; meaning a red coloring but its no real genetical red...

The problem, on the last photo both do have very apparently red streaks visible in this peculiar light; so they ARE torties, er torbies... Not so common with males, but its not forbidden, and does happens now and then.

What baffles me, one of the three cats is probably a ticked tabby. If its a smallish momma, everything is OK. She is heterozygot ticked, but is also a carrier of broken mackerel. So her kittens got the mackerel tabby gene.
But if its one of the kittens, there may be a problem...

Because ticked tabby dominates over other tabbies... But I suppose dear daddy could be a heterozygot ticked tabby, and thus, only some of his babies become ticked tabbies...

 

[mrsacolby]

Sorry I wasn't clear on the pictures, mind is frazzled. The pic with kitties looking at cam is Mom with kitten on her. That kit is Heathen and she is a ticked torbie, she is the one on the left of the three kitten pile. It's the other two kits who have me wondering.

 

[GoldyCat]

I think your two are brown tabbies, just happens to be a really warm brown.